“What does that mean?” “It means the review is moving.” “Moving where?” He tucked the folder under his arm.

“International review.” And the sticker went out through the doorway, carrying my sister’s hundred and fifty thousand dollars with it into a process far larger than my kitchen table.

I watched the orange sticker go out the door on the front of my blue folder and felt something I had not expected, which was relief at being small.

For weeks the whole weight of it had sat on me — my question, my folder, my refusal, my sister’s fury pointed at me alone.

Now the thing had been handed to people with the authority and the reach I did not have, people who could speak to receiving institutions in other countries, who could place a hold and mean it.