Not around letters.
Not around secrets.
Just itself.
Ethan watched.
“Mom?”
“Yes?”
“Do you still wish you had gotten the college letter?”
The question surprised me.
“Yes.”
He nodded.
“Even now?”
“Especially now.”
He frowned.
I explained.
“Knowing about it would have given me a choice.”
“But you’re almost finished with your degree now.”
“That doesn’t erase what happened.”
He considered that.
“Are you still angry at Grandma?”
“Sometimes.”
“You still have dinner with her every Sunday.”
“Yes.”
“So you forgave her.”
“I did.”
“But you’re angry.”
“Sometimes.”
He leaned back.
“That seems contradictory.”
“People are contradictory.”
“I dislike that.”
“You’ll survive.”
He smiled.
I reached across the table.
“Forgiveness doesn’t mean pretending something never hurt. It means I decided the hurt doesn’t get to make every future decision for me.”
Ethan became still.
I knew that expression.
He was filing the sentence somewhere.
