Ruth, Sarah’s mother, had been sick for eighteen months before she died. Diane stepped in immediately—doctors, decisions, paperwork, every phone call that needed to be made. Sarah was the one who stayed through the bad nights. They divided it without discussing it, instinctively, like breathing. Sarah had assumed they made a good team.
Sarah was the one who learned which programs Ruth liked in her final weeks, who held the cup when her hands shook too badly, who slept in the chair beside the bed when the nights were bad. She had not questioned Diane’s role or her own. It had felt, until recently, like love.