“Every detail,” he said.

“I told her on our third date.

I decided I was done being a man with secrets.”

I smiled, and it was a real smile, without a wound in it.

“Then you’re starting off the right way this time.” We would never be a couple again, he and I, and I would never again feel about him anything warmer than a wary, functional goodwill.

But we were, at last, honest co-parents, and for our sons that was worth more than any love I had once mistaken him for having.