monitors blinked green.
Priya came to stand beside me.
‘Are you all right?’ she asked.
I watched Jonah teach another child how to make the stuffed fox bow.
For years, I had thought justice would feel like applause. Like a room turning. Like the person who hurt me finally being afraid.
But that morning, justice felt like a hallway where children could breathe safely.
It felt like a nurse believed before she was silenced.
It felt like my own name on a card, no longer a warning, no longer a wound, simply proof that I had survived every room that tried to throw me out.
I touched the clean lapel of my coat and smiled.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I am now.’
