He was a little quiet, maybe.

A little far away.

But he was always a little quiet and a little far away by then; his father had made him that way, and I had stopped being able to tell the ordinary quiet from the kind that means a child is holding something too big for him.

I said yes to the wedding thinking the worst that could happen was a hard afternoon.

My son said yes knowing exactly what he intended to make happen, and he let me go on not knowing, one more time, so that I would not have to carry it with him.

Chapter 3 — The Wedding He Always Wanted