Chương 5
“Yes.”
“I should have asked what happened before assuming.”
“Yes.”
“I should have defended you.”
Sabrina looked at him.
The last sentence was different.
Because it was the one she had needed.
Not from Florence.
Not from Leah.
From him.
But she also knew something important.
Words were easier when the damage had already happened.
“Why didn’t you?” she asked.
Christopher leaned back.
“I don’t know.”
She waited.
He looked toward the window.
“My mom has always been like that.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“I know.”
“Then try.”
Christopher stayed quiet for a while.
“When I was a kid, she was the only person who was there.”
Sabrina listened.
There it was.
The part of Christopher he rarely talked about.
Not the successful man.
Not the husband.
Not the son who defended his mother.
The child.
“My dad left when I was twelve,” he said.
Sabrina had heard pieces of that story before.
Never the whole thing.
“After that, she worked constantly.”
He swallowed.
“She was exhausted all the time. She made mistakes, but she was trying.”
Sabrina softened slightly.
She understood that.
More than she wanted to admit.
“She sacrificed everything for me.”
“She did.”
“But Christopher.”
He looked at her.
“Someone sacrificing for you does not mean they get unlimited control over you.”
His expression changed.
Not anger.
Something closer to pain.
Because he knew she was right.
“She’s scared,” he said.
“I know.”
“She thinks if I choose you, I’m abandoning her.”
Sabrina looked at him carefully.
“And what do you think?”
Christopher did not answer.
The silence became the answer.
Sabrina felt something break, but quietly.
Not because he chose Florence.
Because he still did not know how to choose himself.
For a few seconds, neither of them moved.
The apartment felt smaller than it had before.
The same couch.
The same quiet kitchen.
The same stack of unopened mail sitting near Leah’s door.
But something between them had changed.
Christopher looked like a person standing at the edge of an answer he did not want to hear.
“I love my mom,” he said.
Sabrina nodded.
“I know.”
“No, I mean it.”
“I know.”
He looked frustrated.
Not at her.
At himself.
“She raised me.”
“She did.”
“She worked two jobs.”
“I know.”
“She missed birthdays because she was trying to keep us going.”
Sabrina watched him carefully.
There was a part of her that wanted to comfort him.
That part had always been there.
The part that saw Christopher’s pain before her own.
But she was beginning to understand that empathy could become dangerous when it only moved in one direction.
“I’m not asking you to forget that,” she said.
“Then what are you asking?”
The question was quiet.
Almost desperate.
Sabrina looked down at her hands.
“I’m asking you to understand that loving someone doesn’t mean letting them hurt another person.”
Christopher looked away.
The words stayed in the room.
For years, Sabrina had avoided saying things that might make him uncomfortable.
She had edited herself.
Softened sentences.
Removed the sharp edges before anyone else could complain about them.
She was tired of sanding herself down.
“My mother thinks respect means obedience,” Christopher said.
Sabrina looked at him.
“That’s what she taught you?”
He hesitated.
“Maybe.”
The honesty surprised her.
Christopher leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees.
“When I was younger, disagreeing with her felt like being ungrateful.”
“And now?”
He stared at the floor.
“Now it feels like I’m hurting her.”
Sabrina understood then.
Not completely.
But enough.
Christopher was not trapped because Florence was powerful.
He was trapped because guilt was the language their relationship had been built on.
“I used to think you were strong,” Sabrina said.
He looked up.
“I am.”
She shook her head slightly.
“I don’t mean strong like working hard or handling pressure.”
His expression changed.
“I mean I thought you knew who you were.”
The sentence landed harder than she expected.
Christopher looked away.
“I’m still me.”
“Are you?”
He did not answer.
The silence was not empty.
It carried every conversation they avoided.
Every dinner where Florence criticized Sabrina’s choices and Christopher changed the subject.
Every holiday where Sabrina smiled through comments that hurt.
Every time Christopher said, “That’s just how she is.”
Sabrina stood and walked toward the kitchen.
She needed movement.
Sitting across from him made it too easy to fall into old patterns.
“Do you remember our first apartment?” she asked.
Christopher smiled faintly.
“The one with the broken heater?”
“Yes.”
“You hated that place.”
“I hated the heater.”
“You said the apartment looked like someone gave up halfway through building it.”
Sabrina laughed softly.
“I did say that.”
“You still decorated it.”
“Because I wanted it to feel like ours.”
Christopher looked at her.
The memory softened his face.
For a moment, he was the man she knew.
Then the moment passed.
“Mom hated that apartment,” he said.
Sabrina stopped.
“She said it was beneath us.”
Christopher nodded.
“She offered to help us buy a house.”
Sabrina turned around.
“She offered.”
“Yes.”
“And then?”
He looked uncomfortable.
“She had opinions.”
Sabrina almost smiled.
Not because it was funny.
Because it was exactly the problem.
Florence’s help had always arrived carrying invisible strings.
“She helped us with the down payment,” Christopher said.
Sabrina looked at him.
“I know.”
“She thinks that means she has a say.”
“Yes.”
Christopher rubbed his face.
“I never saw it that way.”
“I know.”
The response bothered him.
“What does that mean?”
“It means you’ve been inside it your whole life.”
He sat quietly.
Sabrina walked back into the room.
“I need to know something.”
“What?”
“If we fix this, what changes?”
Christopher looked at her.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean tomorrow.”
He frowned.
“Tomorrow?”
“Yes.”
She sat down again.
“If I come home tomorrow, what happens when your mother says something about me?”
Christopher opened his mouth.
May you like
Nothing came out.
“What happens when she decides she doesn’t like how I organize the kitchen?”
