Gable it was all right.

She told her it was not, and that the ease of the town’s cruelty was the part that hurt most, and then she extended grace anyway, with her eyes open, remembering exactly what had happened.

That is the third way, the true one: to forgive without forgetting, to release the desire for revenge while keeping the clear-eyed memory of the wrong.

Because the memory is not bitterness.