Leona looked at them through her own tears, and despite everything—the decades of isolation, the cold shoulders, the whispered accusations—she felt no anger. No bitterness.
How could she?
If she had been in their position, watching their matriarch transform from a cheerful, loving woman into a slab of ice overnight, she would have doubted too.
She would have questioned. She would have believed the rumors.
Instead of resentment, she felt something else. Something warm and fragile and long-forgotten.
Relief.
They finally knew the truth. They understood or were beginning to understand why she had become the way she was.
The weight she had carried alone for forty years, the burden of protecting them from herself, had finally been shared.
And she hoped that maybe this would be enough.
That maybe telling them this much of the truth wouldn't bring consequences and she could stop right here.
