After her funeral, her prom dress became my anchor. I tucked it carefully into the back of my closet. On nights that felt too long and too quiet, I would unzip the garment bag just enough to touch the satin and pretend she was still there.
That dress wasn’t just fabric. It was her voice, her scent, the way she sang off-key while flipping pancakes on Sunday mornings. Wearing it to prom wasn’t about fashion—it was about holding on to a piece of her.
Then Stephanie entered our lives.
My dad didn’t grieve for long. He remarried when I was 13. Stephanie moved in with her white leather furniture, her expensive heels, and her habit of calling everything in our home “tacky” or “outdated.”
