Things We Set on Fire

by Deborah Reed

Forgive me. For God’s sake, line up at my feet and forgive me everything. Just like the poem, Kate had not understood the sober sacrifices of love. Then six years ago it became clear. Staying would have hurt them all, staying could only maim the spirit of the living. Staying was to be a stand-in for her father, for what her mother had done. Yes, Kate had known all along, the way Elin knew. Knowing without knowing. She had no choice but to disappear. She had never been fully part of the world in the first place, one foot in, one out. Only these past six years had she truly come alive. Elin never even knew her, would never know Kate. A mother. A good mother. Rosemary in her kitchen windowsill. Notebooks full of poems. A poet. Elin never knew. Never knew how she’d broken Kate’s heart. Never knew Kate understood that she’d broken Elin’s, too. Dear sister. Dear mother. Oh, mother. So attached to their versions of the truth.