“Everything okay?” she asked.

I glanced at the welcome sign, my books on the desk, and the small brass key to my new room.

“Yeah,” I said. “I think it really is.”

After we hung up, I opened my notebook and wrote the sentence I had been carrying for years.

I was fifteen when my father locked me outside. I survived because someone came back for me.

I learned how to live because, afterward, other people kept the door open.

Then I turned off the light, pulled my blanket over my shoulders, and slept without waiting for a lock to click.