The most loving thing I could do for my father, and the most ruinous thing I could do to my brother, was the same thing: to be careful.

So I was careful.

I wrapped my father in a warm towel and I sat him down, and I did for him what I have trained dozens of investigators to do.

I photographed what needed to be photographed, methodically, with the time and date embedded in every image, my hands steady even though the rest of me was not.

I recorded his statement — his own words, in his own voice, with me asking clear neutral questions and never once leading him, because a good record is a record no one can later pick apart.

I documented the coat.