Not completely.
Maybe it never would.
But enough.
I nodded.
“All right.”
“All right?”
“We start here.”
His eyes filled.
“At sixty?”
“At sixty.”
He smiled.
“Better late than never.”
“Don’t get sentimental. I can still leave.”
“You waited forty-one years. You’re terrible at leaving.”
I squeezed his hand.
And for the first time since I was nineteen, the future did not feel like something that had happened without me.
***
Near noon, Lucas returned with Elena.
She was a warm-eyed woman with dark curls, and the moment she walked through the door, she hugged me.
No hesitation.
No awkwardness.
Just a hug.
“I’ve wanted to meet you for years,” she said.
I looked at Lucas.
“Exactly how many people know about me?”
Elena smiled.
“Less than you’d think. More than he’d admit.”
Douglas groaned.
“Traitors.”
Elena kissed his forehead.
“How are you?”
“Surrounded.”
“Good.”
Then she handed me a small envelope.
