Chapter 7: A New Jersey

After William got his keys, the silence between the three of us settled into something permanent.

Josephine still came to my place, but it was different now. She was quieter. Tired in a way that sleep didn’t fix.

She stopped mentioning Bray altogether. I didn’t ask. Some things didn’t need to be spoken aloud.

For a long while, we drifted. Just the two of us now. The energy we once gave to William — the shared routines, the urgency — it had nowhere to go.

That was when I noticed her looking for something else.

A leaflet. A poster. A bus ad.

Special Olympics.

She’d seen it before, of course. Knew people involved. But never joined. Not after school. Not even when invited.

“Maybe I should,” she said one day. Quietly.

I didn’t push her. Just nodded.

She didn’t sign up that year. Or the next. But the thought had been planted.

What I didn’t know then — what none of us could have — was how much it would come to mean to her.

How it would give her structure again. Purpose. A place to belong.

But also, how it would slowly pull her away.

That first seed, planted in silence, would one day grow into something neither of us could fully control.

And for a time, it would look like everything she needed.

A new jersey. A new team. A new chapter.

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