It was watching, carefully, for the ways the weight had settled into her — her tendency to watch me for signs of sadness, to try to manage my feelings, to appoint herself the caretaker — and gently, repeatedly, relieving her of the post.

It was telling her, in a dozen different ways across a dozen ordinary days, that she was allowed to have bad days without it being her job to fix mine, that she could be silly, and careless, and childish, and demanding, and that none of it would break me, because I was the parent and she was the child and that was the correct and permanent order of things.

It was, more than anything, the steady work of proving to her, through my own reliable presence, that she did not have to hold the family together anymore, because I had it, because I was there, because the adult in her life was, finally, being an adult.

Slowly, over those months, I watched the vigilance ease out of my daughter.