She was not a passive object being moved around a board by cleverer people.

When she learned the truth, she weighed it, in her own way, with her own heart, over her own hour of tears, and then she made a choice, freely and clearly: she chose him.

She chose the marriage.

She chose the life.

It was hers to choose, and she chose it.

I need to linger here longer than the story strictly requires, because this is the point most people miss when they hear what Gabriel did, and it is the point that matters most to me.

People hear this story and they make Gemma the object of it, the thing that was saved, the prize that was protected, the passive center around which the real actors, Gabriel and my parents and I, made their consequential choices.