The silence pressed in, heavy and suffocating. Clara’s head dropped into her hands, her shoulders shaking with quiet sobs. Then the door creaked open. Emily stepped back inside, her eyes red but blazing.
She stood tall, her voice steady as she looked from the couple to Clara. “I’ve always wanted to know where I came from,” she said, each word deliberate. “And now I do. But hearing it doesn’t erase the last eighteen years.”