The week after Amina returned to college felt like the house was learning how to breathe again. The revelation still hung in the air, not as a storm cloud but as a clear sky after rain — everything looked the same, yet somehow sharper and cleaner. Elias and I moved through our days with a new kind of ease. There were no more careful silences or hidden glances. We held hands on the porch without worrying who might see. We talked openly about the future in ways we never had before.
One morning, while we were drinking coffee on the porch, Elias set his mug down and looked at me.
“I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop,” he said. “For Amina to call and say she’s changed her mind or that she can’t accept this. But every text from her has been… normal. Careful, but normal.”
I nodded, wrapp
