I had thought it cold at the time.

I did not yet know how much colder the truth would prove to be.

I worked in that house as a live-in caregiver, and I want to be honest about why, because it matters.

I took the job because I needed the steady paycheck badly, and because it was one of the very few kinds of work that let me keep my baby by my side instead of paying someone else the whole of my wages to watch him.

I was not there out of any grand calling.