Mom’s house is too quiet now. Two weeks after ovarian cancer took her, her lavender scent lingers, but the emptiness grows. My aunt checks on me, but the neighbors’ casseroles sit uneaten—grief steals hunger. Mom was my world, not just because she adopted me at five, a timid girl with a heavy backpack. She and Dad, who had Mark, made me their daughter. “You’re home,” Mom whispered that first night. Mark, older with their smiles, was their biological son, but they loved us equally.
Dad taught me to ride a bike, but his heart attack when I was 13 left Mom as my rock. She was at every school event, helped with projects, and held me through heartaches. “Love builds family,” she’d say when adoption was questioned. After college, I stayed close, sharing weekends and traditions. Then came her diagnosis—stage three ovarian cancer. “We’ll fight,” I promised. For two years, I was there, cooking, caring, and sitting by her hospice bed. Mark, in Chicago with his family, visited twice—once with flowers, once fleeing the hospice, overwhelmed. Mom forgave him, but his distance hurt.
The funeral day was bright, like Mom’s favorite days. I wore the dress she loved, my eulogy tucked away—a tribute to her choice to love me. The church was packed with her friends and former students. Mark, weary, had left planning to me. Before the service, he stopped me. “Don’t speak,” he said. “You’re adopted—no one cares.” The word “adopted” stung. Mom and Dad never divided us, but Mark’s grief turned cruel. I nodded, silenced. His eulogy was flat, missing Mom’s spirit. I sat, tears falling, my words trapped.
A hospice worker gave Mark an envelope from Mom. He read her letter aloud, voice breaking: “To Mark and Emily, my children. Love, not blood, makes family. Mark, you were my light. Emily, you were my chosen heart.” The room stilled. “Emily, read our words,” she wrote. Mark, ashamed, asked me to speak. At the podium, I shared Mom’s warmth, her teaching, her apple pie, and her lesson that family is love and showing up. The crowd wept and smiled—Mom’s kind of moment. Later, Mark apologized. “She never stopped loving you,” I said, urging him to seize time. Mom’s letter proved I was her daughter, with or without a speech.
