Those words hollowed me out from the inside.

Kenzo wasn’t a dramatic child. He wasn’t the type to invent monsters under the bed or startle at shadows. When he was afraid, it meant something. And that night, standing under the airport’s harsh fluorescent lights, I saw a fear in his eyes that didn’t belong to a child.

Inside the terminal, everything glowed sterile and too bright. My husband, Quasi, had stood beside us just minutes earlier looking like the picture of success — tailored gray suit, polished shoes, briefcase in hand, that confident smile he always saved for public settings. People looked at us and saw a power couple. They clapped silently for the image.

But I had been tired for months, a tiredness that clung to my bones. Not from parenting, not from work — a different kind of exhaustion, the kind that comes from pretending everything is fine.