“I know,” she said.
“I’d also like it if you told the truth to whoever Mom told the false story to. I don’t know who she told. But if anyone in the family thinks I agreed to this, I’d like that corrected.”
“I can do that.”
“And–” I paused here. “The repair is going to cost real money. Not a fortune, but real. Rosa’s stabilization, plus my materials when I redo the cuff. I haven’t gotten a full quote but I’m estimating around four hundred and eighty dollars. I’m not going to demand you and Mom pay for it, because I don’t want this to become a financial negotiation. But I do want you to know what it costs, because I want you to understand that ‘just fix it’ isn’t a free thing.”
Elise was quiet for a moment. Then: “I want to pay half.”
“You don’t have to.”
“I want to. I should. Mom should too.”
“You should talk to Mom about what she wants to contribute. I’m not going to arbitrate that.”
“Half from each of us,” she said. “When we have it. It won’t be immediately — I have the wedding, we’re cutting back everywhere. But I’m not going to forget.”
I looked at her across the coffee cups. She looked tired and regretful and her eyes were slightly red at the rims, and she looked, for a moment, like herself at twelve years old, when she’d broken a piece of my jewelry by accident and didn’t know how to apologize and had sat in my room waiting for me to tell her what to do.