The silence that followed Ryan’s confession , “Because I love her” , felt like a stone dropped into deep water, rippling outward with consequences neither he nor his mother was ready to face.
Leah stood frozen, her spine rigid, her eyes searching his as though trying to recognize the boy she once raised. But the man standing before her was not the boy she remembered. He wasn’t the malleable son who bowed to every demand, who lived his life in a cage built from obligation and guilt. He was something else now , something solid, grounded, unmovable.
Her voice broke first.
“When did it come to this, Ryan?” she whispered, each word threaded with disbelief. “You used to hate her. You used to hate being seen with her. All of a sudden you can’t leave her side. When did it come to this?”
Rya
