Every freedom I traded away, I traded for a reason to get up in the morning, and I have never once, in fourteen years, wanted the freedom back.

Chapter 6 — Dad

When Keegan was six, he called me Dad for the first time.

There was no ceremony to it.

We were sitting at the little kitchen table eating waffles on an ordinary Saturday.

“Dad, can you pass the milk?”

I froze with the carton halfway across the table.

He didn’t even notice what he’d said — he was busy drowning his waffle, entirely unaware that he had just rearranged my whole heart with four words and a request for milk.