I caught my dad on my security camera planning to move my brother into my house while I was on a trip, and when my mom said, “Once everything is here, she will not make a scene. She will just accept it,” I set a trap for them.

I took a weekend trip to Santa Fe in late April.

Just me.

No agenda.

No phone calls to manage anyone else’s emotions.

I sat in a cafe watching the sunset over the desert and felt something I barely recognized.

Peace.

In early April, my father asked to meet me at a coffee shop in downtown Denver.

Neutral territory.

I agreed, mostly out of curiosity. In thirty-four years, he had never once asked to see me alone.

He was already there when I arrived, sitting in a corner booth with a cup of coffee he was not drinking. He looked older than I remembered. More gray in his hair. More lines around his eyes.

“Myra,” he said, standing when he saw me.

Then he seemed unsure whether to hug me.

“Thank you for coming.”

I slid into the booth across from him.

“You said you wanted to talk.”

“I did.”