“You needed space to find your own light,” he said, looking at me—not flinching, not looking away. “And I had to believe you’d find your way home.” My heart splintered under the weight of it…because I remembered that version of myself. The girl who stood on the edge of everything, terrified that love would make her small. That it would claim too much. That she’d disappear into someone else’s story and forget how to write her own.
