I had spent seven years imagining my daughter in the ground.

Somewhere in those years, Laura had apparently walked through grocery aisles, celebrated birthdays, and watched seasons change.

Even if there were circumstances I didn’t understand, she’d allowed her mother to die believing the loss was permanent.

How does a person live with that?

Back home, I opened a box of Eleanor’s letters.

She’d written to Emma every birthday, beginning before the child was born.

The letters were ordinary: advice about being brave enough to try new foods, stories about the time Laura brought a frog into the bathtub, jokes about my inability to fold fitted sheets.