There were no wheelchairs beside the kitchen table.
No voices arguing from down the hall.
No one asking whether I’d remembered to buy the right cereal.
I stood in the middle of the living room and hated every second of it.
I also knew it was exactly what was supposed to happen.
A week later, both girls video-called me.
Taryn complained about one of her professors. Brielle complained about the dining hall. Then they argued with each other for nearly twenty minutes while I sat there watching them.
They were eighteen.
Independent.
Stubborn.
Building lives that didn’t revolve around me.
Their mother had come back too late to raise them and too late to repair everything she had broken.
But she hadn’t come back too late for Brielle and Taryn to ask questions.
She hadn’t come back too late for them to hear her apologize.
Most importantly, she hadn’t come back too late for them to decide for themselves what she meant to them.
