My decade of raising the children alone was a matter of record.

And the children themselves, when a court gently asked, were clear about where they wished to be.

After the second year the petitions stopped.

What came instead, eventually, was a letter — no lawyers in it, no demands, just a few photographs of Rhett as a boy, so his children might see they had his face, and a short note asking whether the birthday gifts he sent to the trust had reached them.

I did not burn it.