Chapter 21 - OSRIC AND MARIS
Osric asked to visit Maris’s grave.
Not with Evelina.
With me.
I almost refused because the request felt theatrical.
Then I remembered I could leave if it became theater.
We went.
Winter.
No flowers because he said Maris hated cut flowers.
True.
He stood in front of the stone for a long time.
Then:
“She scared me.”
I looked at him.
“Maris?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“She made you less obedient.”
I laughed bitterly.
“I was thirty-eight when I married her.”
“You were always my son.”
“That sentence explains a lot.”
He nodded.
Then:
“I thought if she died, you would come back toward me.”
My stomach tightened.
“I did for a while.”
“Yes.”
“And then Evelina became the center.”
“Yes.”
“So you attacked Maris’s fidelity to weaken Evelina.”
“Yes.”
No excuses.
Then:
“Did you ever think Maris cheated?”
“No.”
There it was again.
I already knew.
Hearing it at her grave was different.
I said:
“You used a dead woman because she couldn’t defend herself.”
“Yes.”
“I don’t forgive that.”
“I know.”
Then he looked at the stone.
“I’m sorry, Maris.”
I wanted to tell him she could not hear.
Maybe he knew.
Apologies sometimes belong to the living person saying them, not the dead person receiving them.
We stood.
Then left.
No cleansing.
No miracle.
On the drive home he asked:
“Do you think she would let me see Evelina?”
“Maris would have thrown you through a window.”
He laughed for nearly a minute.
So did I.
It felt wrong.
Then right.
Maris had been funny.
Her memory did not have to remain solemn because Osric violated it.
Then I told Evelina only that Grandpa and I visited Mom’s grave.
“Did he say sorry?”
“Yes.”
“To Mom?”
“Yes.”
“Can dead hear?”
“I don’t know.”
She thought.
“Maybe Mom laughed.”
Likely.
Then she asked:
“Did you forgive?”
“No.”
“Still talk?”
“Yes.”
She understood more now.
Relationships are not binary.
Then Osric’s annual trust statement showed his personal holdings declining slightly as he donated more to a workforce scholarship fund.
Was that penance?
Maybe.
Tax planning?
Also maybe.
Not my concern.
He did not name it after himself.
That impressed me more.
Then he asked the council for no honorary chair title at the 100-year company anniversary.
Good.
No patriarch emeritus.
Just founder’s son and former CEO.
Accurate.
Then Evelina was invited to speak at a youth family-business program because reporters still loved the DNA story.
I said no on her behalf at ten.
At sixteen, she could decide.
Not now.
Her childhood was not content.
Then one journalist wrote a book proposal anyway.
We cooperated with no private child material.
Public records are public.
Fine.
You cannot control everything.
That lesson too.
Then the Christmas table.
Evelina sat wherever she wanted.
Osric sat beside a cousin’s toddler.
The toddler stole his roll.
Osric looked at me.
“Should I test him?”
I froze.
Then saw his face.
He realized instantly the joke was too close.
“I’m sorry.”
The toddler ate the roll.
Evelina laughed.
“I think he’s real Valenti now.”
Osric smiled sadly.
“Then we’re doomed.”
Humor returned carefully.
May you like
Never at the child’s expense.
That was the difference.
