By morning the marks on my wrist had gone yellow, and my mother was at my door.
Celia: Two bags. Marcy can bring the rest.
Marcy: She can't just walk in and pack you up.
Celia: I can.
My mother does not argue. She walks through a room and makes decisions with her hands.
Faye: I have classes Monday. Eight students. They paid me.
Celia: Not anymore.
Kiln Yard paid half my rent. It paid for my clay, my paper, my whole life.
Celia: I called the yard this morning. Your classes are canceled. Refunds go out today.
She said it like a woman folding a shirt.
I watched the bakery sign get small in the back window, like the street was erasing it.
Faye: You could have asked me.
Celia: Asking is for things with two good answers.
The Danner house has a gate that clicks shut behind you.
I had lived here for years and it had never once sounded like a lock.
Marcy: I'll bring your stuff Friday. Don't let her eat you.
Faye: She doesn't eat. She schedules.
Celia: Your room is the one over the garden. I had new locks put on the windows.
Faye: I'm not a thing you can put in a drawer.
Celia: A man put his hands on you. He sat in your chair and waited.
Celia: You think a room full of people makes you safe?
Faye: It makes me a person. You should try it.
Her voice went quiet. Quiet was worse than yelling, and she knew it.
Celia: I love you. That is the whole reason.
Faye: Then why does it feel like a punishment?
Celia: The family decides what is safe. Not you. Not the police. Us.
Faye: So I get a vote?
Celia: You get to be alive.
I put my hands on the quilt and looked around a room that was mine and had nothing of me in it.
My phone buzzed. Marcy. You okay?
I typed three words, erased them, and typed them again. Not yet. Soon.
From the window I could see the gate. A man stood outside it in the rain, looking up.
He did not wave. He did not leave. He looked at the house like a problem he had been paid to solve.
Faye: Who is that?
Celia: Someone who keeps things safe.
I pulled the curtain and my wrist ached under the yellow marks.
I have been managed my whole life. Nobody has ever kept me.
I was not going to start calling it love now.