It had felt, for thirty years, like the central tragedy of my life.

I understood now that it had been a mercy.

Being pushed into the shadows had freed me to build something real, out of sight of the spotlight and its demands, while my sister spent her one life terrified of losing a spot in a window that looked out onto nothing.

She had kept her spot right up until the night I walked onto that stage.

And then the window shattered, and she learned, too late, what I had learned early: that a place in that display was never worth what it cost to keep.

Chapter 34 — What I Stopped Doing