Chap­ter 197 of All the Col­ors of the Dark opens with a qui­et yet tense scene as Saint and her grand­moth­er, Nor­ma, sit togeth­er on the porch, the still­ness of the spring evening ampli­fy­ing the dis­tance between them. The evening is warm, but the under­ly­ing ten­sion is thick, almost pal­pa­ble, as Nor­ma begins to speak about Charlotte’s new boyfriend, Matt Leave­sham. Nor­ma sub­tly alludes to the boy’s fam­i­ly back­ground, hint­ing that she knows more about his his­to­ry than Saint had real­ized. It’s a qui­et yet point­ed remark, one that makes Saint feel uneasy, though she doesn’t show it out­ward­ly. As the con­ver­sa­tion con­tin­ues, Nor­ma shifts the focus to some­thing more press­ing: she presents a box con­tain­ing the Eli Aaron case file, which had been sent by Himes, indi­cat­ing that the case is some­thing that Saint should pay atten­tion to. How­ev­er, Nor­ma sug­gests that Saint’s focus should real­ly be on Char­lotte, not on her work, which caus­es a stir of frus­tra­tion with­in Saint. The moment reveals the sub­tle dynam­ics of their relationship—Norma is try­ing to guide Saint, but her approach often feels dis­mis­sive, as though Saint’s pro­fes­sion­al life is sec­ondary to the family’s imme­di­ate con­cerns.

Saint, feel­ing a grow­ing unease, tries to ignore the strain in the con­ver­sa­tion by turn­ing her atten­tion to the book Nor­ma is read­ing, though her mind con­tin­ues to cir­cle back to the under­ly­ing issues that have long plagued their rela­tion­ship. Even­tu­al­ly, Saint can’t sup­press her feel­ings any­more and con­fronts Nor­ma about their strained dynam­ic. She sug­gests that Nor­ma has always held back her true feel­ings, that she has kept her judg­ment and opin­ions hid­den, and it’s left Saint to fig­ure things out on her own. The ten­sion esca­lates when the con­ver­sa­tion turns to Saint’s past, par­tic­u­lar­ly her mar­riage to Jim­my, which is a source of unre­solved con­flict. Saint explains that she made the dif­fi­cult deci­sion to divorce Jim­my, a man she once loved but whose faults became too large to ignore. Nor­ma, how­ev­er, insists that Jim­my had poten­tial and that Saint should have giv­en him more time to change. The dis­agree­ment is pal­pa­ble, as it speaks to deep­er dif­fer­ences in how they view rela­tion­ships, com­mit­ment, and per­son­al growth. Saint, in turn, defends her deci­sion, explain­ing the emo­tion­al and prac­ti­cal rea­sons for end­ing the mar­riage, but her words fall on deaf ears. This exchange leaves both women feel­ing mis­un­der­stood, as if they’re talk­ing past each oth­er instead of tru­ly hear­ing each other’s pain.

The con­ver­sa­tion takes a more poignant turn when Nor­ma soft­ly recalls the sac­ri­fices Saint made in her life, par­tic­u­lar­ly the promis­es she made to God in exchange for Joseph’s return. Norma’s words aren’t just a reminder of the past—they’re a reflec­tion of how much Saint has giv­en up in the name of fam­i­ly and duty. Saint’s emo­tion­al walls begin to crack as she recalls those moments of des­per­a­tion, when her promis­es to God felt like the only thing she had left. Nor­ma, in an unex­pect­ed ges­ture of affec­tion, opens her arms to Saint, offer­ing a com­fort­ing embrace that Saint has longed for but has nev­er received in such a direct way before. For a fleet­ing moment, the walls between them begin to crum­ble, and Saint allows her­self to feel vul­ner­a­ble. She admits to her­self that, despite their dif­fer­ences and their emo­tion­al dis­tance, Norma’s sup­port is still essen­tial to her well-being. This moment of qui­et under­stand­ing between them is sig­nif­i­cant, a brief and rare moment of ten­der­ness that speaks vol­umes about their rela­tion­ship. Saint feels both com­fort­ed and sad­dened by the embrace, real­iz­ing how much she’s need­ed this con­nec­tion through­out her life, yet also acknowl­edg­ing that it has often been over­shad­owed by the unre­solved ten­sion between them.

The chap­ter reach­es its emo­tion­al peak when Saint opens up about the com­plex­i­ties of her feel­ings toward Jim­my. She admits that, while he was an impor­tant part of her life, he isn’t the man she holds in her heart any­more. That man is Patch, and the real­iza­tion that Jim­my was not the one she tru­ly loved is a painful but nec­es­sary admis­sion. This moment of clar­i­ty, though dif­fi­cult for Saint to vocal­ize, is an impor­tant turn­ing point for her. It high­lights the emo­tion­al con­fu­sion and grief she’s car­ried for so long, nev­er tru­ly allow­ing her­self to ful­ly con­front her feel­ings for Patch and what he rep­re­sent­ed in her life. Their dis­cus­sion reveals deep lay­ers of grief, loss, and per­son­al sac­ri­fice, as both women come to terms with their respec­tive pasts. The pain of old wounds resur­faces as Saint con­fronts the com­plex­i­ty of her emo­tion­al his­to­ry with Jim­my, while also acknowl­edg­ing the endur­ing love she has for Patch. This moment speaks to the nature of famil­ial relationships—how past hurts are car­ried with us, often unspo­ken, and how they shape the way we move for­ward in life. The inten­si­ty of their exchange under­scores the idea that heal­ing comes not just through time but through con­fronting the pain and learn­ing to let go of the past.