chapter 28

Lulu's POV Leona did not know what had been rearranged behind the curtain. Leona did not know how many conversations had ended abruptly, how many decisions had been made with clenched jaws, or how many boundaries had been quietly redrawn in the name of protection. None of it reached her. What Leona knew was exhaustion. And, more importantly, what exhaustion no longer felt like. The strange, sinking fatigue that had weighed down every movement weeks earlier was gone. Not eased—gone. The difference was subtle at first, the way an old ache disappears so gradually that the absence feels unreal. Leona woke before the alarm now. Leona finished drills without the familiar fog closing in at the edges of vision. Muscles still burned. Lungs still strained. Sweat still soaked through practice jerseys. But Leona remained present. Focused. Alive inside the body again. The coaching staff chalked it up to adaptation. The team joked that Leona had finally “hit the window.” Leona accepted the explanati