Older.
Thinner.
Her dark hair streaked heavily with gray now, her cheeks hollowed by illness or time or both. But the eyes were the same.
Clara felt her knees weaken.
“Mama,” she breathed.
Her mother looked at her as though she were seeing a ghost.
For a long moment, nobody moved.
The room smelled faintly of medicine, sweat, and stale tea. On the nightstand sat pill bottles, folded cloths, a half-empty glass of water. Clara noticed all of it in fragments, her mind refusing to settle on any one detail long enough to understand.
Her mother’s lips trembled.
“You came home early.”
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