“It’s Julian.” There was silence on the line.

Three full seconds of it, which is a very long time in a phone call, long enough for me to hear him not breathing, long enough for the whole weight of nine years to sit down on both of us at once.

Maya slept on against my chest, unaware that her existence was, in that silence, about to reach across an old and bitter divide and begin, without knowing it, to close it.

Chapter 10 — It’s Julian