All I could do was what I should have done months earlier, which was to show up, and stay, and pay attention from then on with the fierceness I should have brought the whole time.

Shame runs in families, downhill, from the fathers who teach it to the sons who inherit it.

David learned to hide his failures somewhere.

I have had to ask myself, honestly, where.

Chapter 3 — Don’t Protect a Single Person

“We’re going to get breakfast,” I said.