Sam had no reply. His memories of their father were clinical data points: a man who loved football, beer, and his family, in that order. A man who never understood why his youngest son would rather study string theory than throw a spiral.

He never finished watching it. Some episodes, he realized, you have to live instead.

They stood on opposite sides of the grave, two men carved from the same childhood but shaped into completely different geometries.

The silence that followed was heavier than the Texas heat. Sam wanted to explain—about the fellowship, about the opportunity, about the sheer suffocation of living in a town where everyone still called him "that weird Cooper kid." But explanations felt like excuses. And Georgie had stayed. Georgie had taken over the tire shop. Georgie had married the girl with the baby. Georgie had become their father.

He typed back: Georgie?

"I'm not him," Sam finally said.