My daughter’s exhaustion was the thing on my mind.

I walked her to the car, and I buckled her in, and the only thought in my head was: now I take care of her.

Now I make this right.

Now she gets to be a child again.

Chapter 16 — What She Carried

In the car, on the way home, I did not congratulate my daughter.

I want to say that plainly, because I think a lot of people, hearing this story, expect that I would have — that I would have told her she was amazing, a hero, that she had gotten them all back.

And every one of those things was, in a sense, true.