Chapter 13 - GRANDPA'S LETTER
Grandpa’s letter was sixteen years old.
He wrote it while dying from cancer.
Apparently, Dad had never given it to me.
Mia,
You are curious in a way your father never learned how to be.
Do not let his certainty make you doubt your instincts.
A profession is honorable only if you choose it freely.
Money is useful only if it gives you choices.
And family should never require you to become smaller so someone else can feel important.
I read the last line three times.
Jason sat silently across from me.
“Why did Dad keep this?”
“Because Grandpa knew him.”
That answer made sense.
Too much sense.
I folded the letter carefully.
Jason looked down.
“I don’t expect you to forgive me.”
“Good.”
He nodded.
“I’m going to start over.”
“Doing what?”
“I don’t know.”
For once, my brother had no title.
No law-firm badge.
No father arranging the next rung of the ladder.
Maybe that was exactly what he needed.
Mom filed for divorce two months later.
Not because I asked her to.
I didn’t.
She simply decided she was done living as an extension of someone else.
Dad moved into a rented apartment.
The family house went on the market as part of their financial settlement.
I bought nothing from it.
Not the house.
Not Dad’s car.
Not some symbolic object designed to prove I had won.
I already had what mattered.
My company deal.
My independence.
My grandfather’s restored trust.
My name.
Naomi offered me a larger role at the acquiring company.
Vice President of Legal Intelligence Products.
I stared at the title.
“I’m twenty-four.”
“So?”
“I dropped out of law school.”
“So?”
I laughed.
“You really don’t care?”
“I care whether you can build.”
That was the sentence I had waited my entire life to hear.
Not from my father.
From someone who actually understood my work.
I accepted.
Then Naomi smiled.
“There’s one condition.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“What?”
“You need to stop calling yourself a dropout.”
She slid the contract toward me.
May you like
“You didn’t drop out of your future.”
“You chose a different one.”
