The answer is no.
Hate would make her too important.
I hate what she did.
I hate the years she stole.
I hate that my father died fighting to clear my name while I sat behind bars believing he had abandoned me.
But I do not carry her every day.
I carry my father.
I carry the way he wrote, The truth always finds a way out, even when his hands were shaking from illness.
I carry Thomas, who kept a promise to a dying man.
I carry Mara, who looked at an ex-con and saw a case worth reopening.
And I carry the knowledge that a locked door is not always the end.
Sometimes there is an old key.
A hidden room.
A letter waiting in dust.
And a father’s love strong enough to reach his son after death and bring him home.
THE END
