“Why did you wait so long?” Linda asked.

Her mother closed her eyes. “Because I was a coward,” she said. The word coward tasted like nothing. That was the strangest thing. After all these years, after all the bitterness— coward had no taste at all. Empty. Hollow. Like the space where a tooth used to be.

The bitter ones were the worst. Forgive tasted like crushed aspirin. Return like dandelion stem. Mother like burnt toast scraped black.

“Who?” Linda asked.

“To buy honey,” Linda said. “I want to taste something sweet for a change.”

She sat down on the edge of the bed. The afternoon light came through the dusty window and fell across her mother’s hands.

“You said there was something about my father.”