Chapter 27

With her afternoon classes canceled, Serena bought a bouquet of flowers and headed to her adoptive parents’ grave. She gently wiped the dust off the tombstone, then sat down beside it, closing her eyes for a moment of peace. Here was the only place she ever truly felt calm. "Are you... Serena?" A voice suddenly broke the silence near her ear. Serena opened her eyes to find an older woman, probably in her fifties, standing before her. She stood up slowly, confused. "And you are?" "I'm Dorothy Baker. I was an old friend of Eleanor’s. We lost touch for years. I didn’t expect..." Her voice cracked, and tears slid down her cheeks. Serena’s memory didn’t include any visitors at their house. It had always been just the three of them—quiet and cut off from the world. She never thought anyone would show up after they passed. She stood aside silently as Dorothy choked back sobs, speaking to the grave as though Eleanor could hear her. "Poor thing... spent her whole life raising someone else’s chi