Marcus and Patricia reconciled with her in the second year, slowly and partially.

Patricia went first, as mothers do.

Marcus took another eighteen months.

She got married two years ago, to somebody none of us have met.

Wendy told me.

Wendy tells me these things carefully, with a pause first, so I can say I’d rather not hear it, which I have never once said.

And here is the part that people do not expect, and that I only include because it is true.

Three years after all of it, a letter came to Alder Street.