No child should ever have to hold that.

She held it, that day, alone, in front of everyone.

And the room went dead, suffocatingly silent, and I began, at last, to walk toward the front, toward my daughter, to take the weight back.

Chapter 14 — She Saw Me

Kelly set the microphone down on the altar table, and picked up her pink backpack, and zipped it shut, and looked down the long carpeted aisle.

And that was when she saw me, standing at the back of the room.