Next of Kin

As a teenager, I discovered a family secret: that my mother had been married to her childhood sweetheart, who was killed in the final months of World War II. When I was 21 years old, preparing to travel to Europe for the first time, Mother whispered a request: to get her a photo of his grave in a cemetery in France. I came home empty-handed. This is the true story of how, years after she died, I finally got the photo, and came to understand its importance.