Too steady.
I nodded.
“We should go.”
Daniel moved aside reluctantly.
“Claire,” he called after me. “Don't make this about us.”
I turned.
For thirteen years, I had imagined dozens of things I might say if we ever met again.
I could have asked whether he remembered their third birthday.
Whether he knew Eli had almost died from pneumonia when he was seven.
Whether he understood how many nights Owen had fallen asleep with a secondhand electronics textbook pressed against his chest because we couldn't afford a computer.
Instead, I said only four words.
“I didn't come here for you.”
Then I walked away.
Inside the auditorium, sunlight poured across polished wooden floors.
University banners hung above the registration desks. Students in blazers and school uniforms hurried between classrooms, carrying laptops, robotics kits, and thick folders.
Everything smelled faintly of coffee and freshly printed paper.
My sons walked beside me without speaking.
