Why it had always been so easy for him to believe the worst of me.

Why “weak” had come to his lips so readily, this fast, in a public hallway, about a daughter who had spent her whole life being the one who showed up.

But I didn’t ask. There was no answer that would have helped, and anyway, in a few seconds the question would answer itself.

He’d believed the worst of me because a more persuasive person had spent three years arranging for him to, and because it had always been more comfortable than looking closely at his other child. That was the whole of it. There was nothing to ask.

Right on cue, the automatic doors at the end of the corridor hissed open.

Chapter 10 — The Black Folder

A tall man came through them in a dark charcoal suit, a heavy black leather folder tucked under one arm, and the ordinary hospital noise seemed to drop a notch as he came down the hall toward us.