Chapter 10 - A New DawnThe morning sun rose over the city with a brilliant, golden warmth, casting long, peaceful rays across the hardwood floors of our home.
I stood in the kitchen in a comfortable linen robe, brewing fresh coffee while the smell of pancakes drifted from the skillet.
A pair of small, energetic arms wrapped suddenly around my waist.
“Good morning, Mommy!” Ethan cheered, still wearing his favorite dinosaur pajamas—clean, bright green, and entirely unstained.
I turned around, scooped him up into my arms, and spun him around as he giggled with uncontainable joy.
“Good morning, my little explorer,” I smiled, pressing my cheek against his soft hair. “What’s our big plan for today?”
“Building the biggest Lego castle ever!” he declared proudly, holding up his toy dinosaur as if it were the king of the universe.
“Then that’s exactly what we’ll do,” I whispered, carrying him toward the sunny living room where our new life—secure, protected, and completely our own—awaited us.
Richard was a distant, fading memory of a storm that had tried to break us, but had only proven how unbreakable we truly were.
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And as I sat on the living room rug with my son, building towers that reached toward the sky, I knew one thing with absolute certainty:
No one would ever make us crawl again.
