I tried to accept that some wounds never close, only scar. I told myself that love without acknowledgment was still love, even if it left me hollow. When his daughter appeared at my door, clutching legal documents and a letter, I felt the past reach for me one last time. His trust wasn’t large, but it was deliberate, written in a name he’d rarely spoken with kindness.

The letter mattered more. In shaky ink, he admitted what he’d never given me in life: that he saw every small mercy I offered and didn’t know how to answer it. Shame, he wrote, had always been louder than gratitude. His regret arrived late, but it arrived carrying something real. In that moment, I realized my years with him hadn’t vanished into nothing; they had planted something fragile in him that finally found the courage to grow.