I set it on the table.
“Because I got a new job.”
Her smile disappeared for half a second.
“A safe one?”
I understood what she was really asking.
“Yes,” I said.
“A safe one.”
She came around the table and hugged me with the same fierce grip she had used the night of the crash.
“Mom would be proud again,” she whispered.
I closed my eyes.
For three years, I had believed dignity meant enduring whatever was necessary to keep our small life together.
I had mistaken silence for strength because silence was often the only thing I could afford.
Jackson had counted on that.
He believed a burned hand, an empty bank account, and a daughter’s medical bills would make me easy to frighten.
He believed people without power could be treated as though they had no memory, no evidence, and no witnesses.
He was wrong.
The accident did not make me brave.
I had been filing those reports long before the guardrail broke.
Margaret did not give me integrity.
She simply placed authority behind the truth Jackson had tried to bury.
Ella lit a candle and pushed the cake toward me.
“You’re supposed to make a wish,” she said.
“It isn’t my birthday.”
“Maybe wishes work on regular days too.”
I looked around our small kitchen.
Her inhaler was full.
The rent had been paid.
My hand was healing.
For the first time in years, I knew what time I would be home the following evening.
I blew out the candle.
This time, Ella did not have to fall asleep waiting for me.
