Martha was not going to teach it again, not by a single inch, not even in the small and reasonable-seeming ways that had always felt like kindness.

She was going to hand Irene back the one thing that had been taken, and the only way to hand it back was to honor it, without exception, until the girl stopped bracing for the moment it would be taken again.

Three weeks after that day in the hospital, Irene underwent the outpatient procedure to clear the blockage, and it went exactly as the specialist had hoped, and Martha sat in the recovery bay and watched her daughter wake up, and understood that the physical part of this, at least, was going to be all right.

Chapter 19 — The List He Had to Read