Sarah folded her arms. “Yes. You should have.”
Hannah faced her father. “You don’t understand. I like visiting when it feels like your house. But Marissa looks at me like I’m something you forgot to clean.”
Lloyd flinched. “Han, I’m sorry.”
I stepped between them before he could reach for her. “Sorry starts after you stop making your daughter pay emotional rent in your home.”
Marissa scoffed. “That’s unfair.”
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“No,” I said. “Unfair is spraying perfume on a child because she smells like her mother’s house. Unfair is calling control standards. Unfair is watching her disappear into herself and pretending it’s manners.”
Marissa opened her mouth, then closed it.
Lloyd’s mother stood slowly. “Hannah, come here, sweetheart.”
Hannah looked at me first.
I nodded.
“I’m not going to fix you,” Lloyd’s mother said gently. “I only want to show you something.”
She lifted one hand. A thin line of gray clay sat beneath her polished nails.
“I sculpt,” she said. “Badly. But I love it.”
Then she looked at Marissa.
“A little mess never made any girl less worthy of love. I’m sorry I haven’t been here enough, sweetheart. But I’m here now. I never asked Marissa to change you. I love you exactly as you are.”
Sarah looked straight at Marissa. “Some people confuse polish with character.”
Hannah turned back to Lloyd. “I’ll still visit you, Dad. But I’m not staying overnight until I can wear my own clothes and be myself.”
Lloyd nodded, broken. “Okay. I’ll earn that trust back.”
In the car, Hannah whispered, “I wanted him to choose me.”
“He should have,” I said, squeezing her hand. “And until he learns how, I will.”
That night, I sat at the kitchen table and stitched the blue blouse badly.
Hannah touched the crooked seam. “Thanks, Mom. But it’s ruined now, isn’t it?”
I looked at the uneven thread.
“No,” I said. “It’s honest.”
The next Sunday, Hannah came home from her father’s house, paused in the hallway, then walked into the kitchen instead of the bathroom.
“Baked ziti?” she asked.
And down the hall, the bathroom door stayed open.
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