Chapter 25 - YSELLA CHOOSES
Ysella was sixteen when Drusilla asked whether she could attend her school art exhibition.
Not demand.
Ask.
Ysella said yes.
Drusilla came.
Stayed one hour.
Complimented the work.
Did not criticize clothing.
A triumph.
Then she saw one piece.
A mixed-media bedroom.
Cardboard boxes stacked high around a tiny bed.
Stuffed rabbit in center.
Title:
ROOM.
Drusilla stopped.
Ysella watched her.
“Is that about me?” Drusilla asked.
“About what happened.”
“Same thing.”
“No.”
I almost smiled.
Ysella explained:
“It’s about adults deciding kids are movable.”
Drusilla looked at the piece for a long time.
“Can I buy it?”
Ysella immediately said:
“No.”
Old Drusilla would have offered more.
Asked why.
Taken rejection personally.
Instead:
“Okay.”
Another collector bought it later.
Ysella donated half the sale to a local youth housing charity and kept half for art supplies.
Her decision.
No family symbolism imposed.
Afterward Drusilla said to me:
“She made me look terrible.”
“She made art.”
“I know.”
Then:
“I deserved some of it.”
Not all?
Probably.
No one gains perfect insight.
Then Ysella told me:
“I want Grandma in my life.”
I said nothing.
“Not a lot.”
“Okay.”
“Lunch sometimes. Holidays maybe.”
“Okay.”
“You don’t have to.”
That surprised me.
“I know.”
“I don’t want you pretending.”
Good.
I decided:
Joint holidays occasionally.
Not every.
No Drusilla staying in our house.
No financial entanglement.
No key.
No management.
Relationship without access to the control systems she once abused.
That was possible.
Forgiveness, if that word applied, did not require restoring old architecture.
We built a new one.
Then Drusilla came to Thanksgiving.
She asked before entering the kitchen.
“Can I help?”
Mara handed her potatoes.
No one gave her command.
She peeled.
Complained about peeler.
Normal.
Ysella looked at me across the room.
Smiled.
We had reached a version of family I once thought required either total reunion or total exile.
Neither.
Boundaries with contact.
May you like
Memory without obedience.
That was enough.
