“I’ll do it.” I said it before I’d thought about it, because that is what I do and have done since the first week. “I did the sentencing statement. I know the format.”

And Sophie, who had said nothing, said, “Do you actually know the format, or do you just know that you’re the one who does it?”

It wasn’t cruel. That’s the thing about my daughter at eighteen — she has grown into a person who asks the flat, exact question, and she does it without any heat at all, which makes it impossible to argue with.

“Sophie,” Noah said.

“I’m not being mean. I’m asking.” She was picking at the edge of the letter. “You do all the talking. You did it at the sentencing, you did it with the reporters, you do it with the therapist when she asks how we’re doing.

I’m just saying that’s a thing that happens, and nobody’s ever said it out loud.”