"you're allowed to feel it all," she said, and for a moment, the words just hung there like a painting, separate from me, but then this strange warmth started to bloom behind my sternum, a deep, slow unfurling. it wasn't a sudden burst, more like a steady, insistent pressure releasing, and it made my hands tingle, like they finally knew what to do with themselves, not clench. it just… is what it is, right now, and that feels like enough.