Lily stacked medical kits on a shelf.
“That is something you’ll have to discover.”
“Do you think people can really change?”
“Yes.”
“Do you think I can?”
Lily looked at her.
“I think change is something you do, not something you announce.”
Beatrice nodded.
Then she began helping Lily stack the remaining boxes.
On Lily and Ethan’s first wedding anniversary, the family gathered again at the lakeside estate.
The eastern wing remained beautiful, but Lily no longer saw only flames when she looked at it. She saw Rose laughing near the fountain. She saw Henry teaching his grandson to skip stones. She saw Ethan walking toward her with two cups of coffee.
Beatrice approached carrying an old photograph.
It showed the rescue teams standing outside the burned estate three years earlier. Their uniforms were covered in soot. Some looked exhausted. Others stared silently at the ruins.
Lily stood near the edge of the photograph, her injured arm wrapped in a temporary bandage.
Jonah stood beside her.
Beatrice handed Lily the picture.
“I found it in the fire investigation records,” she said. “I thought you should have it.”
Lily touched Jonah’s face with one finger.
“Thank you.”
Beatrice hesitated.
“I know I can never repay you.”
Lily looked up.
“You don’t have to.”
“But I want to honor what you did.”
“Then honor the life you were given.”
Beatrice glanced toward her family.
Henry was laughing. Rose was chasing a child across the grass. Ethan was waving at Lily from the terrace.
“How?”
“Be kinder than you were yesterday.”
Beatrice considered this.
“Is it really that simple?”
“Simple isn’t the same as easy.”
Lily tucked the photograph carefully beneath her arm and walked toward Ethan.
The sun was setting over the lake, turning the windows of the estate gold.
Once, Lily had entered that house surrounded by smoke, unable to see more than a few feet ahead. She had moved through the darkness by following voices and trusting that somewhere beyond the flames there was a way out.
Now there was no smoke.
There were only people gathered beneath an open sky.
Ethan placed a cup of coffee in her hand.
“Your expensive machine is still better,” he said.
“I told you.”
He kissed the scar near her wrist.
“Do you ever wish Daniel hadn’t told us?”
Lily looked at the family in the garden.
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because some truths hurt when they come into the light.”
She slipped her hand into his.
“But they hurt more when they’re left burning in the dark.”