She flinches as if struck. Part of me wants her to feel it—the hurt, the betrayal, the endless nights of looking over my shoulder, waiting for his shadow to reappear. All because she couldn't bring herself to leave with Jake and me in tow.

"Nate, I'm not trying to tell you how to feel. I'm trying to⁠⁠—"

"What?" My voice cracks with raw fury. "Help me? Protect me? Save me? You're fourteen years too late for that."

Her face crumples, tears welling up even as she fights to maintain composure—the same way she had through every one of his pathetic apologies.

"I know. I'm sorry, Nate. I'm so sorry⁠⁠—"

"I was forced to grow up, Mom." The words tear from somewhere deep and wounded. "I didn't have a fucking choice in any of this. You did. You could've left the first time. You should've left the fifteenth time. But you didn't. You chose him over Jake and me every single time. And for the life of me, I can't understand why."

Her voice drops to a whisper. "It's complicated, Nate. None of this is that easy to⁠⁠—"

"Not easy?" Rage trembles through me, my fists clenched tight enough to draw blood. "You want to talk about what's not easy?"

The memories burst forth like a broken dam.

Not easy is being suffocated by the hands of a man who's supposed to be your hero when you're nine.

Not easy is having your face smashed into a wall at thirteen because you're trying to stop him from hurting your Mom.

Not easy is walking around with more broken bones by seventeen than most people will have in their entire lives.

I step closer, my voice rising with each word.

"Not easy is lying awake outside your little brother's bedroom every single night after a fight, praying to God he doesn't go after him, too. Then waking up to go to school the next morning pretending everything in life is just fucking dandy. That's not easy, Mom!"

Years of silence has finally cracked open, everything spilling out like shattered glass. My voice shakes with the intensity of memories I can't bury anymore.

"Hearing you scream every time he came home reeking of booze—that wasn't easy. So forgive me if I can't empathize with your choice to stay with someone who didn't give a fuck if you lived or died."

Her tears fall freely now, each of my words landing like physical blows. Nothing could undo the years of damage, the choices she'd made.

She takes a shaky breath, her entire frame quivering. When she speaks, her voice is barely audible. "I'm sorry."