Sixty-nine years married to a planner had taught me a thing or two about keeping a still face.

I pulled the papers toward me and I reached for my reading glasses, and I made a small performance of struggling with them, of being a tired old woman overwhelmed by legal print, which was precisely what Shirley believed me to be and precisely what I needed her to go on believing.

Then I began, slowly, to actually read.

Line by line, taking my time, letting her think my slowness was confusion.

It was a power of attorney, as she had said — a document that would hand her authority over my money, my property, my decisions, my self.