Sometimes I watched Megan laugh with friends at school events and felt a small, familiar ache for what I’d thrown away.

I let it pass.

Regret wasn’t permission to interfere with her happiness.

At a school concert that December, our three children stood onstage wearing paper crowns.

Hazel waved at me from the front row.

Mason and Bryce sang at different speeds, completely untroubled by the chaos they created.

Megan stood beside me in the audience.

When the applause began, we both rose.