Whether he was getting enough of something.

And one Sunday in my kitchen she said it straight: that she thought Beto ought to live with me.

That I had the house and the schools and the money, and that Carmen had done wonderfully but that there was no comparison, and that surely anybody looking at it fairly would say the boy would be better off.

And I want to be honest about the first thing that happened in me, which is that some small part of me heard a version of it that was not unreasonable.

That is what eleven months of proximity to a very expensive life does.

Then I said this, and I have thought about it since and I would not change a word.

“No.

And I want to say why properly, because you’re going to try this again in some other shape and I’d like to only do it once.

“Carmen raised him on her own for seven years and seven months.

She did the fevers and the nights and the school and the shoes.