They Called Me Beautiful

Epilogue

Maddie was only seventeen the first time she told me she felt old. It became a recurring theme in her later years, as if somehow she knew what was coming for her. Maybe in some small way she sensed it.

And maybe that’s another reason she hid from all of us: so we wouldn’t have so much to lose when she left us.

I never saw so many people cry at a funeral as I saw cry at Maddie’s. Later perusals of her journals and computer files would reveal to us how little of the real Maddie, the dark Maddie, we actually knew, but we loved her all the same. She couldn’t hide every facet of herself, no matter how hard she tried.

And even today she lives on, in our memories, in our hearts. And for me, through my daughter. Madeleine Kate LeFevre was born a few days before the anniversary of Maddie’s death. Time will show how like Maddie she really is, but for now it’s enough for me to call her Maddie and think wistfully that I see my old friend’s smile in the light of my baby’s eyes.

I have reason again to envy Maddie. After all, she’s in heaven, at the side of the Savior we learned to love together. But I don’t envy her any longer. I’m living the life she always wanted, with a house of my own, a loving husband, and a darling little girl. I’m determined to enjoy it, for her, for me, for everything we shared and didn’t share.

They called me beautiful. But Madeleine Proctor had the true beauty, the kind that even death can’t take away.