It was the first thing he had written that didn’t sound like a lawyer had crafted it for him.

I did not answer immediately.

I sat in my backyard after bedtime, listening to the wind move through the fig leaves.

The part of me that had once loved him wanted to believe every sentence.

The part of me that had carried three babies through sleepless nights understood that remorse and reliability were different things.

With Nadia’s help, we established a gradual process.

A child-development professional would help us explain the relationship in language the children could understand.