He held her hand and let her grieve, out loud, in the cool evening air, a loss that was real and would always be real, and he let it be exactly as large as it was.

Some griefs are not stations you pass through on the way to being fine.

They are rooms you learn to live in.

And the kindest thing one person can do for another is not to drag them out of the room but to come in, and sit down, and stay.

And a few weeks after that, Winnie came running in with a school form — an art-exhibition submission — and pushed it at Ifeoma with a pen.

At the bottom it read Signature of Parent or Guardian. “Winnie, I’m not your guardian,” Ifeoma said gently.