Morgan set a second photograph beside it: one taken that afternoon, of herself and Evelyn on the porch swing.
The next morning, she caught a bus into town to pick up supplies while her car was being serviced. At the third stop, an elderly man boarded with a cane, searching for somewhere to sit.
Morgan rose immediately.
“Here,” she said. “You can have my seat.”
He thanked her and settled by the window.
Nothing mysterious happened. Nobody whispered a warning. The bus simply rolled on through the autumn sunlight.
And that was enough.
Morgan had spent years believing that love meant enduring whatever someone demanded of her. Now she understood that love could also be a stranger speaking up, a friend opening a spare room, or a grandmother leaving a place where her granddaughter could begin again.
She watched the trees pass and felt, at last, that she was traveling toward her own life.
