And at that, my mother turned to me, her eyes wild with a panic I had never once seen on her composed face, and she stepped toward my bed with her hands outstretched in desperate appeal.

“Chloe.

Chloe, darling, talk to him.

We are your parents.

We raised you.

You cannot let him destroy your brother’s future.

Tell him to stop, Chloe, tell him to stop this.” And I want to note, for the record, the precise sequence of that afternoon.

My mother had walked into this room and, before asking a single question about my health or my child’s, declared my newborn son a disgrace who would never be held.