I sat on the couch and looked around the house that held my entire life—my childhood, my marriage, my children’s laughter. Percy breaking a vase at three. Rosie baking cookies at seven. Humphrey and I reading and listening to jazz on winter nights.
Where did it all go wrong?
Maybe when we mistook love for giving them everything. Maybe when we stopped demanding accountability. Maybe when I kept doing it after Humphrey died, desperate to be needed.
My phone rang—Rosie. I didn’t answer. A message came: Mom, are you okay? Why aren’t you answering?
I muted the phone. Let them worry—though I suspected they weren’t worried about me, but about who would pick up Obadiah tonight like I’d promised.
The doorbell rang. The cab was early.
I spotted an old wedding photo of Humphrey and me on the mantel—simple dress I sewed myself, his borrowed suit, both of us smiling like the world belonged to us.
I tucked it carefully into my bag.
And when I stepped outside, I didn’t look back.
I locked the door, walked down the porch steps, and handed my suitcase to the driver.
“Where to?” he asked.
“To the bus station,” I said.
“Vacation?”
I smiled. “No. A new life.”