“Five years, Sophie.”

“Five years,” she agreed. “Every therapy session where Ruthanne talked about the guilt of forgetting. I sat there and did the guilt of forgetting. It was like being praised in a language I don’t speak.”

I did not tell her it was all right. I want that on the record, because everything in me wanted to and because five years earlier I would have.

I said, “Three years is a long time.”

“Yes.”

“You were ten and then eleven and then twelve.”