“Well,” he said finally, voice thick. “Guess that’s official now. Best terrible handwriting I’ve ever produced.”
I didn’t cry. I came close.
Mom cried enough for both of us, standing in the doorway with a dish towel still in her hands.
Even Jonah, who normally treated any display of emotion in the kitchen as a personal invitation to make jokes, stayed quiet, watching from the hallway with something unusually serious on his face for an eleven-year-old.
We couldn’t file it officially until I turned eighteen that August, but Ms. Alvarado told us the signed petition would sit ready, waiting for the exact date, no delays, no extra steps.
The summer between felt different than any other one I could remember. Not because anything dramatic happened. Because for the first time, nothing needed to happen for things to feel settled.
We spent most weekends the same way we always had, Marcus grilling something slightly too long on the back patio, Jonah and Lily arguing over whose turn it was to pick the movie, Mom reading on the porch swing with one eye on all of us at once.
