She glanced back once before opening the door.
The tree stood where it had stood before. The plaque remained attached to the fence, and the road continued beyond it.
Nothing had dramatically changed.
The accident had not been undone. The past had not become less real. The difficult years had not disappeared.
Yet something about her relationship with the place had shifted.
She no longer felt that the road belonged entirely to the worst moment of her life.
It also belonged to the people who had planted the tree, to the years of growth that had followed, and to the ordinary life that continued around it.
And now, in a small but meaningful way, it belonged to her present as well.
She opened the car door and sat behind the wheel.
For a moment, she remained still, allowing herself to absorb the fact that she had completed something she once believed she could not do.
