I needed the record to be public enough to survive their retelling of it.

There is a difference, and holding onto it was the only thing that let me look at myself afterward.

Chapter 10 — My Father Arrives

Herbert came through the ER doors looking a decade older than he had at breakfast, his jacket half on, his chest heaving.

He found the room and dropped into the chair by the bed and pressed my mother’s hand to his forehead, whispering that he had her, that he wouldn’t let her go.

She let her eyes flutter and gave a thin, practiced groan, and I watched my father break himself in half with grief over a woman who had called his terror the easiest part.