A truck entered the intersection from the right.
The video jolted as the driver behind them slammed his brakes.
Then impact.
I made a sound I had never heard myself make.
Grandma closed the laptop.
The room tilted.
“She caused it,” I whispered.
“We don’t know that a prosecutor can prove intent,” Grandma said carefully. “But we know she was there. We know she lied. We know your father lied to protect her.”
“Mom died thinking—”
I couldn’t finish.
Grandma did.
“She died trying to protect you.”
I thought grief had already taken everything from me.
I was wrong.
There are rooms inside grief.
You open one door, and there is another behind it.
And another.
And another.
Dad came to Grandma’s house that night.
I knew because I heard his voice downstairs.
“Eleanor, please. I need to see my daughter.”
Grandma’s voice was ice.
“You needed to see her when she was limping through your house in a medical boot.”
“Don’t do this.”
“You did this.”
“I made mistakes.”
“You made choices.”
I sat at the top of the stairs wrapped in a blanket, my cast resting against the banister.
Dad sounded smaller than I had ever heard him.
“Please. Five minutes.”
Grandma said, “Chloe decides.”
I almost said no.
I should have said no.
But some part of me needed to see his face and know whether a father was still in there.
Grandma helped me downstairs.
Dad looked awful. Unshaven. Red-eyed. His coat wrinkled like he had slept in it.
For a second, I saw the dad who taught me to ride a bike, running behind me with one hand on the seat, shouting, “I’ve got you!”
Then I remembered the way he let go.
“Chloe,” he said.
I sat in Grandma’s armchair.
“You have five minutes.”
His eyes filled.
“I am so sorry.”
I waited.
“I should have listened to you.”
“Yes.”
“I should have stopped her.”
“Yes.”
“I was grieving.”
“No.”
He flinched.
“You were cheating,” I said.
His face crumpled.
“It wasn’t that simple.”
I laughed without humor.
“You slept with Mom’s sister in Mom’s bed.”
His mouth trembled.
“Your mother and I were broken before that.”
“She was sick.”
“She shut me out.”
“She was dying.”
“She wasn’t supposed to die!”
The shout echoed through the room.
Grandma stepped forward, but I lifted my hand.
Dad covered his face.
“I didn’t want any of this.”
“That’s not the same as being sorry.”
He lowered his hands.
“I didn’t know Valerie treated you like that.”
“You didn’t want to know.”
He stared at me.
That landed.
Good.