“Mom!”
I kept walking.
“Are you serious?”
I passed the customer-service desk.
“Evelyn!” Grant barked.
I did not turn around.
Then Melissa shouted the sentence that ended everything.
“If you walk out, don’t expect to come back tonight!”
My hand tightened around my purse.
I stopped.
Not because I was reconsidering.
Because a strange feeling moved through my chest.
Relief.
I looked over my shoulder.
Melissa stood beside the abandoned carts, furious.
Grant looked humiliated.
People were pretending not to stare.
I nodded once.
“All right.”
Her expression changed.
“What?”
“You said not to come back.”
I pushed open the sliding doors.
“So I won’t.”
Then I walked outside.
I had no car.
Grant had convinced me to sell mine two years earlier because, according to him, “There’s no point maintaining another vehicle when we can drive you anywhere.”
