He found me at the river window.
I had come back from the tributary and gone straight to the window seat — the right window, the one with the sound — because the conversation with Marcus had settled something in me that needed the river's specific continuity to fully land.
He came in with two coffees.
His, with the sugar.
Mine, without.
He sat beside me.
"Marcus told me," he said.
"I know," I said. "I felt it through the bond."
"What did it feel like?" he said. "When he said it."
I thought about it honestly.
"Like putting down something I didn't know I was still holding," I said. "The forgiveness. I've been carrying it for months — the decision about whether to say it, when to say it, whether it would change anything." I held his gaze. "It changed something."
"What?" he said.
"
