Seventeen — the night of my graduation, the biggest moment of my school life. Since I was a little girl, I dreamed of wearing the same dress my mother wore to her own graduation. When she passed away from cancer when I was twelve, that dress became my most precious keepsake — a piece of her love I could still touch. Years later, Dad remarried. Stephanie, his new wife, cared only about appearances. She threw away most of my mother’s belongings, calling them “junk,” and filled our home with shiny,