‘I was trying to make sure you had enough strength to care for yourself.’

‘I know,’ I told her.

‘Are you going to show the children?’

‘Not all of it.

Not yet.

There are things they can understand now and things they’ll be able to understand later.’

She agreed.

Before hanging up, she reminded me how the boys and girls had shared one incubator room’s tiny corner of my attention without ever seeming to compete for my love.