I didn’t frame the check or memorize the numbers; I memorized the way the air felt when the door closed behind me and no one followed. With Alina’s money, I bought secondhand furniture, cheap dishes, and time—time to unlearn the idea that love must be earned through sacrifice. Every bill I paid alone became another stitch in a life that belonged only to me, even if it was stitched over an old wound.

When news of my father’s illness reached me, it wasn’t nostalgia that answered; it was the quiet conviction I’d built in the years apart. I paid for the surgery, signed papers, moved my mother somewhere safe, and left the past where it belonged. Their remorse came late, but it came. I didn’t forgive to forget; I forgave to be free, carrying my boundaries like armor and my compassion like a choice.