The Day I Dropped My Husband at the Airport, My Eight-Year-Old Daughter Warned Me Not to Go Home. Minutes Later, I Saw Why.

We have years.”

Her certainty caught me by surprise.

I had spent months thinking in short periods: make it through tonight, the next meeting, the next court date, the next difficult memory.

Lily was imagining a future in which a tree could become tall enough to give us shade.

Later she drew a picture of the redbud with a tiny yellow house behind it.

Above the drawing she wrote: THIS IS WHERE WE LIVE NOW.