My earliest memory of my biological mother wasn’t really a memory at all.

It was my father’s voice, years later, careful and controlled, like he’d rehearsed the words so they wouldn’t slice me open.

“She said this life wasn’t enough for her,” he told me one evening when I was finally old enough to ask the question that always lived behind my ribs. “She said she deserved better. I think she wanted to take you… but her boyfriend didn’t want to raise another man’s child.”

He paused there, the way people do when they’re trying to keep their anger from showing.

“She said she understood. That it wasn’t personal.”

I remember staring down at my hands and feeling something in my chest go quiet and cold. Not because I didn’t understand what he meant—but because I did. Completely.

Not personal.

Like I was a coat she’d forgotten at a party.

My dad must’ve seen my face because his hand came down on my shoulder, warm and steady.

“The choices she made have nothing to do with you, Ryan. Nothing. You hear me? You’re a great kid.”

I wanted to believe him. I tried to. But when someone who’s supposed to love you decides you’re optional, it plants a question you spend years trying to outgrow.

What was wrong with me?

Growing up, I didn’t measure time by birthdays or school years. I measured it by the sound of keys in the door after dark.

My dad worked two jobs, sometimes three. Some mornings I’d come downstairs and find him asleep on the couch, still in his work clothes, his boots kicked off like he’d fallen into the room rather than walked into it. Some nights he’d bend over me while I pretended to sleep, kiss my forehead, and whisper, “So