Rebecca POV

I knew something had changed the moment Maxwell walked through the door that evening. It wasn’t dramatic or loud; it was subtle, almost fragile, like the quiet after a storm when the air still trembles but the destruction has stopped. My son looked lighter, younger somehow. His shoulders weren’t hunched under invisible weight, and for the first time in five long years, his eyes didn’t look hollow. I didn’t know why he was happy, but I knew with absolute certainty that it ...