And sometimes…
They come back.
Not as the children you remember.
But as the adults you hoped they would become.
I smiled and whispered to myself:
“Happy 60th, Linda.”
Then my phone buzzed again.
Grant had sent one last message.
“Mom, next birthday, I promise I’ll knock like a normal person.”
I laughed so hard I nearly cried again.
Maybe turning 60 wasn’t about looking back at everything I’d lost.
Maybe it was about looking around the table…
and realizing how much I had actually built.
