One morning, Noah asked whether Daniel had ever held him as a baby.

I was slicing strawberries and for a moment the knife seemed impossibly heavy in my hand.

“No,” I said.

“He wasn’t there when you were born.”

Noah accepted the answer and went back to his cereal.

Then he asked whether William had held him.

“Not that I know of.”

“So Grandpa made a box for somebody he never met.”