The house smelled like old paper and new wood when the realtor led us through the lot. It was a small clearing at the edge of town—sunlight dappled through the trees, and the ground sloped gently toward a brook that hummed like a private song. For the first time since the chaotic months of motel rooms and gossip storms, the idea of owning something didn’t feel like a fantasy but like a blueprint that might actually become a home.
Mark walked the perimeter with a kind of reverence I hadn’t seen before. He ran a fingertip along an imaginary line where the shed might sit, where the van would park, where the corner could be dug for a little raised bed of tomatoes. “This is quiet,” he said, taking it in. “You could put the workshop over here, and we’d still have space for a porch.”
I watched
