Stiles walked into the kitchen where his father was quietly drying dishes.
His hands were still shaking from the memory and he tried to still them as he twisted them into his shirt and stepped closer to his only remaining parent.
"Dad?" His heart was beating so hard in his chest he thought it might be smothering out the sound of his words but the nod from his father told him he had heard.
"Did I kill mom?"
The question rang out in the quiet kitchen and everything seemed to still as he waited for an answer.
He couldn't stop his lip from quivering and he trapped his bottom lip between his teeth to stop them.
The sheriff turned around at his question dropping the dish towel on the counter and moving towards his son.
"Of course not Stiles! Why would you ever ask that? What happened?"
The teenager backed away a little, looking at the floor as his tears slid from his cheeks to hit his shoes.
"Mom thought I was trying to hurt her and she died thinking I…."
Stiles scrunched his eyes closed as his silent tears turned into sobs and he felt his fathers arms around him.
"That was not your fault son. That was the disease and no matter what the dementia did your mother always loved you. Your mother didn't once blame you and neither did I."
Stiles was on the floor now, his knees having given out as the sheriff held his son so close he could feel his quick heart beat against his chest.
The dementia had taken so much from them but John was determined that it would not take the memory of Claudia's love from them.
As stiles cried in his father's grasp another memory surfaced. One where he had gotten lost in their dark house after waking from a nightmare.
He had found a cupboard stuffed with blankets and deemed it safe to hide in.
But his mother soon found him there and she simply crawled into the nest of blankets he had made and held him to her.
Her gentle fingers wiped away the last of his tears as she whispered to him "wherever you are momma will find you and she will always keep you safe. My love for you is as big as the world my darling"
"And as bright as the sun." He whispered back and had finally fell asleep in her arms.
As he lay in his father's arms now he vowed to remember his mother at her best. When she loved him.