I processed death certificates, three of them, in triplicate.

I sorted insurance forms.

I organized medical files.

I made phone calls to utilities and schools and banks, explaining, over and over, to strangers, that the account holder had died, that all three of them had died, listening to the small intake of breath on the other end each time.

And in between the paperwork, I moved through a house that was full of them.

My biological family, in six months, never once called to ask whether I needed help, or groceries, or simply a voice on the phone at three in the morning.