“Her cabinmates actually created a rule.”
“A rule?”
“They call it the Mia Rule.”
Nobody was allowed to give away a turn until they had taken their own turn first.
I almost laughed.
But Denise was serious.
“They’ve been protecting her from herself.”
Then she said something that stayed with me.
“Mia doesn’t need to become less generous. She needs to understand that generosity doesn’t mean disappearing.”
Continued on the next page
The Truth
That evening, I asked Mia about it.
At first, she shrugged.
“I just like helping.”
“Why did you give away the horseback ride?”
“Someone else really wanted it.”
“And you didn’t?”
She looked at me.
“I did.”
That one word broke my heart.
“Then why didn’t you go?”
Mia looked down at her bracelet.
“I thought about how much you worked for me to come here.”
I didn’t say anything.
She continued.
“I knew you worked extra Saturdays.”
My throat tightened.
“You knew?”
“I know everything costs money.”
“Mia…”
“You skipped buying new shoes.”
She said it like she’d been keeping a ledger.
“I know Grandma had to help with dinners.”
I sat beside her.
“You weren’t supposed to worry about that.”
“But I did.”
Then she finally said what she’d been carrying for months.
“I thought if you worked that hard to send me here, I should make it worth it.”
I took her hands.
“You did.”
She shook her head.
“I could have worked more. I could clean. I could give things to people who didn’t get them.”
I looked at my thirteen-year-old daughter and realized she’d misunderstood the entire gift.
I had thought I was giving her an opportunity.
She thought I was giving her a debt.
