I felt a sudden, sharp ache for all the time we had lost. I wanted to cry for the boy he was and the man he had become in the shadows. But looking at him, I didn’t feel the urge to scream or fight.

There was a strange, heavy peace in the room. We weren’t the people who had left each other behind anymore. We were just two old souls who had finally found the way back to the same porch.

I reached across the table and took his hand. His skin was rough, calloused by a lifetime of hard work, but his grip was firm. We sat there in the quiet of the late afternoon, watching the light fade into a soft, bruised purple.

“I’m here now,” I said.

He just nodded, a small, weary movement of his head. He didn’t need to say anything else. We both knew the weight of the last five decades wasn’t going to vanish overnight. But the star had brought us to the finish line.

I stayed until the sun was gone. We didn’t solve anything that mattered in the grand scheme of things. We didn’t undo the years of silence or the prayers Mama said into the dark.

But as I drove back south, the air felt a little thinner, a little easier to breathe. I left the star behind, but I took the peace with me. It was enough. It was more than enough.