And so, mostly, I submitted, and told myself I was choosing peace, when really I was just choosing the version of the situation in which I did not have to be called petty.

It works on a lot of us, that trap.

It worked on me for years.

I had spent months, longer, telling myself those little comments did not matter.

That she was just an overprotective mother who doted on her boy.

That it was easier to let it go than to make it a fight.

I had told myself that Liam would grow into his fatherhood in his own time, that the late nights would teach him, that he would rise to it.

I had built a whole patient hopeful story out of excuses.