My sixteen-year-old daughter came home from cheerleading practice with mascara streaked beneath her eyes.
She didn’t say hello.
She didn’t tell me how practice went.
She didn’t even take off her shoes.
She simply walked past me, rushed upstairs, and locked herself in her bedroom.
“Maya?”
Nothing.
I knocked again.
“What happened?”
Her voice came through the door, barely above a whisper.
“Nothing, Mom. Please.”
I stood there for several seconds, completely confused.
Maya had always been the bright one.
Sweet.
Outgoing.
The kind of teenager who could walk into a room and somehow make everyone else smile.
She loved cheerleading. She loved her friends. And normally, after practice, she would come through the front door talking so quickly that I could barely keep up.
But lately, something had changed.
She was quieter at dinner.
She spent more time alone.
Sometimes I’d catch her staring anxiously at her phone.
