“And because it worked, Dad.

“That’s the thing nobody gets.

I wasn’t miserable.

I was eleven and I was running a house and I was extremely good at it and everybody said so, constantly, for six years.

“You don’t understand what that does to a kid.

I didn’t get handed a burden.

I got handed a job that I was better at than any adult in the building, and everybody was grateful, and I got to be the reason it all held together.

“It was the best thing that had ever happened to me.