The kitchen window held a gentle spring evening in its frame, the kind of golden light that made the yard look like it belonged in a magazine. I stood at the sink with an unused dish towel in my hand, watching the sky blush pink behind the neighbor’s maple tree.
For the first time in months, I allowed my shoulders to relax.
Austin had been quiet all year.
Not exactly unhappy. Just somewhere I could not follow.
I kept telling myself it was senior-year nerves. College decisions. The pressure of nearly being an adult.
But it was something deeper, and I knew that, even while I refused to say it aloud.
His father had been dead for nine years. Long enough that I no longer startled at the empty chair, yet some nights I still caught myself setting three places at the table without meaning to.
