Chapter 15
The planetarium remained ours.
For a while I avoided the observation lounge.
Then Lucia turned three and became obsessed with stars.
Of course.
Elena suggested we take her.
I stared at her.
“You sure?”
“It’s a planetarium.”
She smiled.
“Not a battlefield.”
Good distinction.
We went on a quiet afternoon.
No reception.
No capos.
No Preston crashing into telescope racks.
Lucia ran between foam planets and shouted every wrong name confidently.
Mars became “red moon.”
Saturn became “ring ball.”
I approved.
Then she found one scorched star-map tube left from the old display.
Probably meaningless to everyone else.
Elena noticed.
So did I.
She touched it.
“Throw it away?”
I asked.
She shrugged.
“It’s cardboard.”
Perfect.
We threw it away.
No shrine.
No ritual.
Then Lucia asked why Mommy’s ultrasound picture had a burned corner.
Elena had kept it.
Of course she had.
Not hidden.
Just part of the baby album.
We told her simply.
“Someone made a bad choice before you were born.”
“Why?”
“Because adults get scared too.”
She accepted that.
Then asked for ice cream.
May you like
Again.
Children understand scale better than adults when we let them.
