Mercy loses meaning when it requires pretending no harm occurred.

Real mercy looks at the harm clearly and chooses not to extract everything it could. Mercy that requires everyone to pretend nothing happened is not generosity, it is erasure, and it usually costs the injured person more than it costs the one being forgiven. The harm goes unspoken and the pressure to move on lands on the wrong side.

If you are offering forgiveness, name what you are forgiving. If you are being offered it, you are allowed to say the harm out loud first.