And it was around the throat of a stranger my five-year-old recognized from my bedroom.

She caught me staring and touched it, self-conscious.

“Is something wrong?” Every animal instinct in me wanted to tear it off her neck and demand to know who she was.

And I did not, because I am a nurse, and I have sat with enough families in enough courtrooms of the heart to know exactly how a scene in a grocery store gets used — how she made a violent public scene becomes she’s unstable, she’s unfit, becomes a father’s advantage in a custody fight.

So I smiled.