“We can file an emergency petition tomorrow morning,” Arthur said. “But the courts do not move instantly, Ava. It will take forty-eight hours, minimum, to get a hearing.”

“I don’t have forty-eight hours,” I said. “The university will drop me from the program tomorrow at noon.”

“Then you know what you have to do,” my father said.

He reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a sleek silver pen.

He placed it on the table next to his scotch glass.

“Sign the waiver, Ava,” he said. “Let us fix this.”

I looked at the pen, then at my mother’s pleading eyes, and finally at Brandon’s defeated posture.

They wanted me to bend, to slip back into the quiet, compliant role I had played for years.

They wanted me to let them erase my grandmother’s final gift to me.

“No,” I said.

My father’s expression did not change, but his jaw tightened.

“Then you have made your choice,” he said.

“I have,” I said.

I walked over to the coat rack, grabbed my damp jacket, and pulled it over my shoulders.