He made the boy’s breakfast every single morning.

He earned his son the only way a father ever really can — not with presents, but with presence, one ordinary morning at a time, until my son, who had once apologized for existing on a stranger’s floor, learned what it was to be somebody’s whole world.

Chapter 20 — The Doors Were Open

The intercom in the kitchen chimed one afternoon.

“Ms.

Mariana,” the gate guard said, “there’s a woman out here named Paige.