Chapter 3
Zoria read the grant letter standing beside Vanessa’s desk.
It covered most of the cost of living on campus for her first year. She had spent those same three weeks worrying that even if she kept the scholarship, we couldn’t afford the rest.
I had been worrying too.
Vanessa had known.
“Why hide this?” I asked.
She pressed her hands together.
“If she moved away, Kendra would feel abandoned.”
Kendra stood in the hall. She had followed us upstairs without my noticing.
“I’m going to school twenty minutes from here,” she said. “You told me Zoria wanted to stay home with me.”
Vanessa faced her.
“I knew you needed your sister.”
“I needed you to stop making everything a competition.”
The room went quiet.
Kendra’s voice shook, but she continued.
“When I didn’t get into Bellmont, you said they’d made a mistake. You kept asking what Zoria had written in her application, like that would explain why she got in and I didn’t.”
“I was trying to understand.”
“You were trying to make me angry at her.”
Zoria folded the grant letter and held it against her chest.
“Kendra, I thought you were angry at me.”
“I was embarrassed,” Kendra said. “I wasn’t angry with you.”
They looked at each other across the desk. For the first time that day, Vanessa wasn’t speaking for either of them.
Mr. Avery collected copies of the letters with Zoria’s permission. He gave her the name and direct number of someone in admissions who would handle the review.
“Your statement is clear,” he told her. “We’ll send you confirmation as soon as the withdrawal is removed.”
Zoria nodded.
After he left, I asked Renee to take the girls to dinner. I needed to talk to Vanessa, and I did not want them trapped upstairs listening.
Zoria hesitated.
“You’re not going to let her tell you I misunderstood?”
“No.”
“You said you’d talk to me after work before. Then she said we could do it another day.”
“I know. I should have come to you. I’m doing that now.”
She looked at me for another moment, then went with Renee.
Vanessa and I sat at the kitchen table. Through the window, I could see the tables still set in the backyard. The cake box remained unopened.
“I need every message you sent to Bellmont,” I said.
“She has her place back.”
“That doesn’t erase what you did.”
“I know.”
“Then show me.”
Vanessa took out her phone. She had used an email account she created with Zoria’s name and birth year. The withdrawal form had been sent from it. There were also messages asking whether the scholarship could be transferred to another student.
I read that question twice.
“You asked if Kendra could have Zoria’s award?”
“I didn’t know how their process worked.”
“You knew it wasn’t yours to give.”
She stared at her hands.
“I kept telling myself I was being fair.”
“Fair to whom?”
She didn’t answer.
I photographed the messages for Zoria and Mr. Avery. Then I told Vanessa she needed to stay somewhere else while I figured out how to keep both girls safe at home.
“Kendra is my daughter,” she said.
“Yes. Talk to her before you leave. I won’t stop you. But I won’t ask either girl to sleep under the same roof as you tonight.”
Vanessa called her sister and packed a bag.
Renee brought Zoria and Kendra home after dinner. By then Vanessa had gone. Kendra walked into the quiet house and looked toward her mother’s room.
“She left?”
“She’s staying with Aunt Lisa tonight,” I said. “You can call her.”
“I don’t want to yet.”
Zoria put the grant letter on the kitchen table.
“I want to know one thing,” she said. “Who told the university something was wrong?”
I had almost forgotten to ask Mr. Avery.
“He said an employee flagged the form.”
“That’s why he came to the party?”
“I contacted admissions after Vanessa told me the scholarship had disappeared. He agreed to bring the records today.”
Zoria frowned.
“Who gave you the number?”
Kendra stepped forward.
“I did.”
She looked frightened, as if she expected Zoria to be angry.
“I found the letter in Mom’s desk yesterday. I called the number at the bottom. I told them you were upset and I didn’t think you’d signed anything.”
Zoria stared at her.
“You knew?”
“I knew something was wrong. I didn’t know she forged your name until they checked.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Mom was watching me. I wanted someone who could actually fix it to know first.”
Zoria crossed the kitchen and hugged her.
May you like
Kendra held on tightly.
Watching them, I understood how close Vanessa had come to breaking something neither girl wanted broken.
