“No one has told me that she is dying now,” he said.

“The planning made me afraid, and I think I started talking to myself as though the worst outcome was certain.”

That mattered.

A mother preparing for contingencies was not the same as a medical prediction.

His fear could explain the urgency he felt.

It could not turn the guardianship packet into proof that a child would soon be living with us.

“I sent money,” he said.