As she handed me mine, I remembered another moment from the train.
After Lucas had realized that I wouldn’t withdraw my complaint, he had looked so uncomfortable that I had almost felt responsible for making him feel better.
That bothered me more than I wanted to admit.
“Mom?”
“Hmm?”
“Something strange happened when he started begging me to drop the complaint.”
She looked up.
“What?”
“I almost felt sorry for him. I knew he’d been rude, but when he started looking embarrassed, I wanted to tell Curtis to forget the whole thing. Just so Lucas wouldn’t feel bad.”
My mother sat beside me.
“That isn’t strange, Gabby. You’ve always cared about other people’s feelings.”
“Sometimes I think I care about them more than my own.”
She was quiet for a moment.
“There’s nothing wrong with having compassion. Even for someone who has treated you badly. But compassion doesn’t mean you have to pretend nothing happened.”
