Chapter 6 - The Aisle We Walked TogetherThree months after the canceled wedding, the lodge offered to return a few personal items left behind in the chaos. Among them was Piper's flower basket. We drove out on a clear Saturday morning.
The garden terrace no longer held chairs, lights, or decorations. Pine trees moved gently past the empty arbor while sunlight crossed the mountains behind it.
Piper carried the basket to the start of the aisle. "I practiced this walk for weeks. I never actually got to do it."
"Would you like to finish it now?"
She hesitated, then handed me a few silk petals still left in the basket. We walked slowly toward the arbor together while she scattered them across the empty path.
No guests. No music setting the pace.
At the end, she looked up. "What happens after we reach this part?"
"We decide where to walk next."
That answer became a new tradition. Every year on Diane's birthday, Piper and I picked somewhere neither of us had been — a museum, a mountain trail, a new restaurant where we'd order dessert first. It let her mother's memory become part of movement instead of only grief.
Simone eventually sent Piper a written apology through our attorney — admitted that jealousy over Diane's memory had curdled into resentment toward a child who couldn't defend herself. The counselor reviewed it before letting Piper decide whether to read it.
May you like
She put it away in a drawer, unopened. "Maybe I'll read it when I'm older. I don't need her explanation right now."
I respected that. The story belonged to the child who had once been silenced inside it.
