Chapter 14 - Learning to Be AloneHealing was not dramatic.
There was no magical morning when I suddenly forgot everything.
Some days were difficult.
I would hear a familiar song and remember Trevor.
I would walk into the kitchen and remember Evelyn demanding something.
I would open a drawer and find an old receipt from a vacation I had paid for.
But slowly, the memories became smaller.
They stopped controlling the room.
I started meeting people again.
I spent more time with friends.
I traveled.
I worked.
I laughed.
I discovered that being alone was not the same as being lonely.
One evening, I stood in the greenhouse during a thunderstorm.
Rain struck the glass roof.
The orchids trembled gently in the wind.
I realized something.
The woman who had walked into the shed six months earlier had believed she had lost everything.
But she hadn't.
She had lost a husband who didn't deserve her.
She had lost a family that treated generosity like weakness.
She had lost a marriage.
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But she had found herself.
And that was worth more than the villa.
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