My parents had no response to that.
Mom began crying quietly.
Dad pressed the elevator button.
Neither apologized.
Neither explained.
When the doors opened, they stepped inside.
Mom looked at me one last time.
“Everything we did was because we loved both of you.”
I shook my head.
“Love that requires control isn’t the kind of love Grace needs.”
The doors closed.
Daniel and I stood there in silence.
Then he said, “You know you actually scared me more than the surgeon did.”
I looked at him.
“You deserved at least five minutes of terror.”
“Fair.”
“I hated you.”
“I noticed.”
“For about three minutes.”
“Better than I expected.”
I handed him the contract.
Then I hugged him.
Not as the boy I once thought I would marry.
Not as the man who had taken my sister from me.