Chapter 3 - The Place Called Willow GroveLevi slid slowly down the wall until he sat on the floor. Then he said something that genuinely stole the breath straight out of my lungs. He was crying openly now. "I never actually cashed a single one," he whispered. "Every check they ever sent went straight into an account opened under Annie's own name instead. Every single dollar. She'll have all of it, whenever she genuinely needs it. Every penny belongs entirely to her."
I wanted desperately to believe him. But something genuinely wasn't adding up properly. "Then why sign it at all? Why put your own name on something so genuinely disgusting?"
Levi looked down hard at the floor. "Because I saw exactly where they were actually planning to send her. A place called Willow Grove."
The name itself meant absolutely nothing to me. But the particular way he said it made my own knees go weak instantly. I sank down onto the cold tile floor across from him, because my legs simply wouldn't hold me upright any longer.
"Your mother showed me the actual brochure herself," he continued. "She said the two of you were both adults now, and that Annie was becoming a burden nobody in the family genuinely wanted to carry going forward."
"That's genuinely not true. She's not a burden at all, and I would have looked after her myself, if she'd ever actually needed that from me."
"They never once planned on telling you any of it," his voice dropped so quiet I had to lean in close to hear him. "Your mother told me plainly, 'Elena deserves a life entirely her own. We won't chain her permanently to Annie.'"
"She actually said that to you?"
"She offered me a formal settlement to marry Annie. Full legal guardianship transferred alongside it. I didn't sign for any of that part, though. I signed because I genuinely love her. Because I wanted her to have exactly the life she actually deserves."
I looked down at the paper crushed tight against my own chest. One particular thing I genuinely couldn't get past. "And Annie actually knew about all this?"
Levi nodded slowly. "I told her, about a year into our marriage. I genuinely couldn't keep lying to her any longer. She cried hard at first. Then she laughed. Then she told me plainly she wanted to keep me regardless."
He smiled faintly through his own tears.
"Why didn't you ever tell me about any of it?"
"Annie specifically asked me not to. She said you'd go straight to war with your own parents, that it would genuinely destroy the whole family. I kept that particular promise, right up until today, when she asked me to make an entirely new one instead."
We both turned together to look back down the empty corridor. I thought about the way Levi brought Annie fresh flowers every single Tuesday, for absolutely no reason at all. The way he could recite entire lines from her favorite movie by heart. Their marriage had never once been some kind of performance. Their love was genuinely, entirely real.
But I genuinely couldn't manage to forgive my own parents for what they'd secretly attempted. "I hated you for about two whole minutes back there," I whispered.
May you like
"I'd have hated me too, honestly. For considerably longer than that."
Just then, hurried footsteps came down the corridor toward us. I turned to see the doctor approaching fast. Something in his eyes told me instantly he was bringing news I genuinely wasn't ready to hear yet. I stood up and braced myself hard against the wall.
