Twice with Ximena present and twice not.

She is sixteen now and she will be seventeen in January and there is no version of the future in which anybody stops her, and the family has accepted that, and Odile accepted it first, which mattered more than anything I did.

Teddy said the thing out loud.

Not to me — she had already said it to me on a phone in June.

She said it to the other five, in that August conversation, which is why I am glad I was there.