“Did you ever imagine this?” he asked.

“Not even close.”

He looked at me.

“Do you regret coming to the cabin?”

I thought carefully.

I regretted the pressure that pushed me toward the courthouse, my father’s silence, and the people who treated a stranger’s work boots like evidence of worthlessness.

I regretted that Silas had withheld facts I deserved to know.

I did not regret demanding a different future, or the way we had slowly learned to trust each other after those mistakes.