This is the rest of your life.”

I looked across the courtroom to where Rhys and Mira sat side by side, heads bent over a single sketchbook they were both drawing in, elbows knocking, and I did not have to think about it at all.

“I do,” I said.

“And I’m honored to be her mother.”

The judge signed the decree, and Mira, who had come to me as a niece in temporary custody, became my daughter in full.

She was permitted to receive supervised letters from prison, and the first few she would not open.