The envelope was not from that week. Dad had mailed it to my old apartment months earlier, and the postal service had routed it through airport lost property after a damaged package exposed the address. Inside was Mom's final Christmas recipe, copied in Dad's handwriting, with a note saying traditions changed when the person holding them changed. He had written it before our argument and never mentioned it.

I called him after the last traveler left the cot area. He answered without asking whether I had seen the news. I read his note aloud and asked why he could accept change in a recipe but not in my life. He said recipes stayed on paper while my choices frightened him. Mom's illness had made uncertainty feel like a warning, and my emergency work kept uncertainty in view.

I told him fear explained his reaction but did not authorize conditional invitations. If home depended on choosing work he respected, it was not home I could trust. Dad said he understood, then corrected himself and said he wanted to understand. We agreed that future disagreements would not be settled by exile, silence, or invoking Mom as evidence.

My rescheduled flight departed on December twenty-sixth. I considered going directly to my apartment, but Dad offered to meet me without assuming where I would sleep. At arrivals, he stood with Colin near a bench, leaving the path open. My suitcase rolled between us. Dad asked whether I wanted to come home for breakfast. Before I answered, the airport manager called my name over the public address system and asked me to return to Gate Twelve. I did not turn immediately. Dad glanced at the suitcase, then at me, as if practicing the patience we had discussed. Colin quietly picked up my coat and waited.