I stared at the message on Leo’s phone for what felt like hours.
The kitchen around me suddenly felt unfamiliar. The same kitchen where I had packed his lunches, helped him with homework, and watched him blow out eighteen birthday candles now felt like a place where my entire past had come back to confront me.
My hands were still trembling.
I looked at my son.
The little boy I had carried across the graduation stage eighteen years ago was now standing in front of me as a grown man, holding the answer to a question I had buried for nearly two decades.
“Leo…” I whispered. “Read it to me again.”
He swallowed hard.
“I already read it three times, Mom.”
His voice cracked.
“I didn’t know if I should show you.”
That sentence hurt more than anything.
Because I knew exactly what he meant.
He wasn’t afraid of finding out about Andrew.
He was afraid of hurting me.
I reached across the counter and grabbed his hand.
“You did the right thing by coming to me.”
But deep down, I wasn’t sure if I believed my own words.
Because for eighteen years, I had lived with one version of the story.
Andrew left.
