“You humiliated me,” he says.
Not I hurt you. Not I lost my family. Humiliated me.
The strange thing is that instead of pain, you feel a clear, almost scientific relief. There it is. The core sample. Even now, after legal orders and public testimony and the sight of his daughter coloring in a waiting room while adults discuss whether he can be trusted around her, he still believes the deepest injury in the story happened to him.
“No,” you say. “You did that on your own.”
You walk away before he can answer.
Spring arrives slowly in Ohio, all mud and wet branches and reluctant light. Your life does not transform overnight into some glowing montage of reclaimed womanhood. Healing is less glamorous than that. It looks like therapy on Tuesdays. Emily wetting the bed twice and then bursting into tears because she thinks that means she is a baby. It looks like budgets, legal fees, and standing in the grocery store too long because no one is rushing you, and you no longer know how to choose cereal without anticipating criticism.
