My daughter-in-law laughed as she gave me a $2 scratch-off for my 73rd birthday. Ten months later, my own son shoved a senior living brochure in front of me and said, “We already picked your room.” They thought I was too old to fight back. They had no idea what I had been hiding.

For the first time since I moved out, he sounded more interested in understanding what had happened than in finding a way around it.

PART 12

Colin arrived carrying a cardboard box from the attic.

It held old photographs, a chipped ceramic mug he’d made in second grade, and a blue scarf Arthur had given me on our twentieth anniversary.

“I found these,” he said.

“I thought you’d want them.”

I was touched that he’d noticed what mattered to me.

I was also wary of turning the gesture into more than it was.