In the days since the shooting, Renee’s loved ones have been forced into roles they never asked for: reluctant witnesses, accidental advocates, fractured narrators of the same unbearable story. One relative fixates on the decision that placed her near the operation at all; another clings to memories of her laughter, her notebooks filled with unfinished ideas, the way she knelt to tie her son’s shoes. Their disagreement isn’t cruelty—it is grief, searching for somewhere to land.
Outside their homes, the story is stripped into statements, footage, investigations, and public outrage. Inside, it is quieter and far more complicated. There are meals that go uneaten, toys that no one moves, a boy who has lost both parents before he understands why people chant his mother’s name. Whatever inquiries conclude, they cannot answer the question echoing through her family and community: how to live with a loss that feels both senseless and permanent.
