The Baby Shower Cradle and the Name Tag Inside

She shoved me into the china cabinet at her own baby shower, then told the room I was trying to steal the cradle.

I'm Wren. I teach preschool at the school my family has run for forty years. Until today I thought my only losses this year would be my mother — and this was the first event I'd agreed to attend since the funeral. Now my job and the last thing my mother left me are both in Dana's hands.

Dana has told everyone for two years that she found the walnut cradle at an estate sale. She is the woman who knows how much my mother meant to me. She handed me a gift bag at the door and told me to sit at the kids' end of the table.