I stood there frozen, my mind spinning, my heart pounding in my chest like it was trying to break out. I didn’t yell. I didn’t cry. I just said quietly, “It’s all right.” But it wasn’t. Not even close.

Something deep inside me cracked that day. Something I didn’t even know could break after sixty-five years of holding this family together through every storm life threw at us. I remember walking to the kitchen, pretending to tidy up just so I wouldn’t have to look at them. They went right back to laughing and scrolling through their phones like nothing had happened,