She looked past me toward the glass wall where the plane sat waiting. “But Grandma said we were all going to the mountains.”

“I know.”

“Did we do something wrong?”

That question nearly broke me.

“No,” I said, crouching down so I could look her in the eye. “We didn’t do anything wrong.”

I said it with more confidence than I felt.

The truth was, I already knew my family had a talent for making me feel like an afterthought. I’d spent years pretending not to notice the small cuts. The forgotten invitations. The “accidental” text messages sent in a group chat I wasn’t included in. The family dinners where I paid the bill, drove everyone home, and still heard my mother say, “You’re so good at handling little things.”

Little things. That was what they called my whole life.

But this? This was different.

This was deliberate.

I stood there while they boarded without me, and for one long second I thought I might actually faint. I wanted to run after them, to demand answers, to force somebody to look at my face and tell me this was a mistake. But Ellie was still beside me, and I could not fall apart in front of her.

So I swallowed it.

I bent down, kissed her forehead, and told her we were going home.

The Uber ride back to my apartment was silent except for the soft hiss of the heater and Ellie asking if we could still make hot chocolate when we got home. She had chosen a tiny red suitcase for this trip and had packed it herself with two stuffed animals, three books, and a pair of fuzzy socks she was proud of because they had little snowflakes on them.

When we walked through the door, the apartment felt too quiet. Too small.

I made her grilled cheese and tomato soup, the kind she always asked for when she was upset, though she was too polite to admit it. She ate half of it, then pushed the bowl away and asked if I was mad.

“Not at you,” I told her.

“Are you mad at them?”

I almost laughed at the innocence of the question. Almost.