“But Samuel and Charlotte are gone too,” I said, and even now, months later, the words cost me something to speak.

“There are no children of mine left to protect.

So I have done the only thing left that honors what that money was always for.

It will protect other people’s children instead.

It will keep some other mother from standing where I stood, between caskets.

That is what the money is for, Dad.

It was always for children.

It is still for children.