It is not an easy forgiveness.

Some nights it still won’t come.

Chapter 4 — The Crackers

I got them both inside and onto the sofa, and even in the warm house they were shivering, so I pulled two heavy blankets from the closet and wrapped them up.

Daisy would not speak.

She stared at me with wide, blank eyes, and when I asked if she was hungry she gave no answer at all, and something about that emptiness frightened me more than crying would have.

I went to the kitchen and came back with a pitcher of water and a box of crackers, and the instant I set them down Daisy grabbed the crackers with both small hands and began shoving them into her mouth, frantic, too fast.