“And it worked, right? That’s why the company died. Because of the audio.”

“Partly. There were also—”

“Mom.” She looked up. “Did it work?”

“Yes,” I said. “It was the thing that made it move.”

Phoebe nodded slowly, absorbing it, and then she asked the question that reorganized the last seven years of my life and that I had somehow never once been asked by anyone.

“So you used me too,” she said. “Just on the other side.”