The space no longer felt haunted.
A staff member was arranging chairs for a charity dinner.
Someone laughed near the kitchen doors.
Glasses clinked.
Ordinary life had returned.
Sophie slipped her arm through mine.
For years, I had believed protecting her meant keeping a door open whenever she needed money.
I was wrong.
Sometimes protection meant closing the account, freezing the transfer, preserving the evidence, and refusing to be manipulated by guilt.
Sometimes love was not access.
It was a boundary strong enough to stop the person using her, and a place beside me when she was finally ready to walk away.
