The call came in the middle of a lazy Sunday. Christian had been lying on the couch with his head on your lap, scrolling through his phone while you absently combed your fingers through his hair. The ringtone shattered the calm, and when he saw the caller ID, Aunt Vanessa, he sat up straight.

You watched his smile fade with every second he listened. His free hand clenched against his knee, his chest rising unevenly.

When he hung up, he stared at the wall like the air had been sucked out of the room.

"Chris…?" You asked carefully.

He blinked, then finally whispered. "Charlie. She… She lost her leg. Stage three cancer. They had to amputate."

Your heart dropped. Christian’s voice cracked on the last word, and you could see his eyes glisten. You wrapped your arms around him, letting him bury his face in your shoulder, whispering. "We’ll get through this, love. You’ll get through this."

But later that night, when he finally drifted off to sleep beside you, you lay awake with your chest tight. His family had never really liked you; too boyish, too rough, too much of everything they didn’t expect for their precious Christian. He used to joke about being the princess of his family, but the truth was they treated him like it, and you as the outsider.

This… This was your chance to change that.

The number haunted you. $20,000. That was what Vanessa had said a prosthetic would cost. Twenty thousand just to give Charlie the chance to walk again.

You sat at the kitchen table with your sketchbook, pencil flying across the page. Prosthetic leg. Simple structure. Sturdy. Balanced. Something human.

By midnight, you were in the garage. You picked up a thick block of wood, heavy and unyielding, and whispered. "You’re gonna be something."

Days blurred together.

The rasp of the saw. The sting of splinters in your palms. The steady scrape of sandpaper smoothing edges until they were silk under your fingertips.

You carved the shape of the leg, curved it to match a human calf, then moved on to the foot; a nightmare of angles and balance. A millimeter off, and Charlie would stumble. You poured every ounce of focus into sanding, shaping, testing.

When you scavenged an old bicycle shock absorber, you nearly laughed out loud. A spring of movement. A bounce of comfort. It was perfect.

One morning, Christian found you slumped at the workbench, wood shavings in your hair, grease streaked on your cheek. He leaned on the doorframe, eyes soft.

"You haven’t slept." He said gently.

"I’ll sleep when she walks again." You mumbled without looking up.

Instead of arguing, he just walked over, set a steaming mug of coffee by your elbow, and kissed the crown of your head.

One week later, a family dinner at Christian's mother's house. Dinner at the Convery house was always intimidating. Christian’s mother’s critical glance. His father’s polite but cool nods. His cousins whispering.

Charlie was there, pale and quiet, her pant leg neatly pinned where her leg used to be.

Your heart thumped as you slid the wrapped object across the table. Forks clinked against plates as the room went silent.

"I, uh… I made something for you, Charlie." You said, your throat dry. "It’s not… Perfect. But I didn’t want money to be the reason you couldn’t walk again."

Christian squeezed your hand under the table.

Charlie’s fingers trembled as she tore the paper away, revealing polished wood. Gasps rippled around the table. A leg. Hand-carved, smooth, with a gleam of metal at the ankle where the shock absorber caught the light.

"You… You made this?" Charlie whispered, tears spilling before she could stop them.

For the first time, Christian’s mother didn’t look at you with disapproval. Her lips pressed together, her eyes wet.