“I care about him.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“I know.”
She looked at me.
“I don’t know yet.”
And somehow, saying it seemed to free her.
Calvin had spent eighteen months trying to help the woman he had married return to him.
Melissa had spent eighteen months trying to understand whether the man standing beside her belonged to her memories or only to her history.
Neither of them was wrong.
But both had been afraid to admit that surviving did not automatically restore what time had changed.
“What do you want?” I asked.
Melissa looked surprised.
“Nobody has asked me that exactly.”
“Then I’m asking.”
She considered it.
“I want an apartment.”
I smiled.
“That’s very specific.”
“Small. Somewhere near Havenwood for now.”
“Done.”
She gave me the look she used to give when I tried solving every problem with a checkbook.
“I don’t mean buy me one.”
“I know.”
“You absolutely meant buy me one.”
“Maybe a little.”
She laughed again.
Then her expression softened.
“I want to learn how to live independently.”
“You will.”
“I want Ava in my life.”
“She wants you in hers.”
“And I want Calvin in my life too. I just don’t know what that means yet.”
“It doesn’t have to mean anything today.”
Melissa looked at me.
“You’ve changed.”
“Your mother would disagree.”
“No. She’d say you finally became trainable.”
That was so exactly Dorothy that we both laughed until we cried.
Three weeks later, Melissa moved into a one-bedroom apartment five minutes from Havenwood.
She chose it herself.
