mother mailed me a Christmas card the following year with no note inside.
My father never contacted me again.
Lena sent a baby announcement months later, as if we had merely drifted apart instead of detonated.
I did not answer.
What I bought that Christmas was not really a house.
It was the end of a role.
And sometimes I still wonder who in that room was most wrong, who deserved forgiveness, and whether I would do it differently if I had one more chance.
Then I remember the silence after the deed hit the table, and I know this much for certain: truth sounded better in that house than my name ever had.
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