That wasn’t true though. I knew. I’d known before I got on the plane in DC. And what was more, I was ready. I just needed to show up to my own life and stop using the people I loved as excuses to not live for myself.

Determined, I opened the Skype app and clicked the icon to video call my mother. After only a few seconds, I saw her smiling face.

“Mijo.”

I smiled back at her and took a deep breath. “Hey, Mamí. I wanted to tell you about how my plans have changed.”

She widened her eyes and brought her face closer, worry lines etched around her mouth. “Are you all right? You’re worrying me, Desta.”

I shook my head, resisting the urge to reassure her, to say whatever I needed to in order to make her relax. I thought about Elias driving back to his family and how scary it had to be to do it alone. But it was how it had to be, no one could do this for him. He had to do it for himself, and I had to do the same.

“I don’t think I’m going to take the new job.” My vision blurred from holding my breath and my heart pounded in my chest. This was what I’d promised myself I’d never do: never give my mother a reason to be sad, to feel like another part of my father was dying.

“Oh?” She cocked her head, as if she was trying to read what was going on inside my head. “Did something happen? Are you staying in Addis longer?”

I shook my head and brought my knees up to my chest. “No, I just—I think I want to go to grad school, do something different.” I closed my eyes and just said it. “I think I want to do social work school. There’s a program at NYU that focuses on working with refugee children in the States. I think that’s what I want to do. I like this work a lot…”

I looked at the screen and my mom’s face was serious, but the faraway look she had told me she was thinking hard. Trying to figure out what I wasn’t ready to say yet. Finally, she turned her eyes to the screen. “Desta Joy, I think you need to hear me say this.” She paused then, clearing her throat, obviously bracing herself. “There is nothing more important to me than for you to be happy.” She clicked her tongue in that way she did when she thought things were in a sorry state. “We’ve lost too much, mi amor, to waste time on things that don’t fulfill us.”

A knot closed my throat when I heard the same words Elias had said to me coming from my mother.