What she did not mention was that the arrangement paid her.

That she was quietly taking illegal placement fees off the books, matching desperate women to buyers and skimming the difference.

She sat across a desk from me at the worst moment of my life and she told me, gently, that I would never be able to afford my own child — because a frightened, broke, pregnant woman was exactly the kind of woman her business was built on.”

Around us, the nearest wedding guests had gone quiet and still, and the quiet was spreading outward across the lawn like a ring in water, and I was aware of it, and I did not lower my voice.