“How long have you been keeping track?”

He shrugged, which meant always.

I thought about Judge Harlan leaning over the bench: it was never your responsibility to save your mother today.

I had heard that as a kindness aimed at Nolan. Sitting at that table, I understood it had been aimed at me, and that I had missed it by two years.

He’d stood up in a courtroom at eight years old and it had worked. He’d dug a shirt out of a trash can and it had worked.

Every single time this boy had taken the weight of an adult problem onto himself, the universe had rewarded him for it. Of course he was doing the household books at ten. We’d taught him that this was his job.