Onstage, Jennifer screamed.
“That’s not true! Dad, tell him that’s not true!”
She spun toward Lucas and grabbed him by the lapels of his tuxedo.
“Do something! You told me your father was weak!”
Lucas did not look at her. His eyes were fixed on his mother. Mary stood beside me, wrapped in my navy jacket. She was trembling slightly, but her spine was straight. Her bare head shone beneath the lights, dignified and magnificent. The illness had attacked her body. It had not touched her soul. Lucas took one step toward her. Tears filled his eyes, but they were coward’s tears.
“Mom,” he murmured. “Please.”
He stretched out a shaking hand.
“Stop him. Tell him this is a mistake. I’m your son.”
The hypocrisy made me sick. He was not crying for the pain he had caused his mother. He was crying for his bank account. Mary looked at his hand. The same hand she had once held while teaching him to walk. The same hand she had cleaned when he fell from his bike. Then she slowly lifted her own. Fragile. Pale. Marked by the blue veins of chemotherapy. And gently, she pushed his hand away. It was the softest rejection I had ever seen. And the most final.
“You were my son,” Mary said.
Her voice was barely above a whisper, but the microphone carried it through the entire ballroom.
“Tonight, I only see a stranger in a suit.”
