Every night I fed Micah in the dark and made myself a set of promises about the daylight, and every morning I put on the tired, harmless face and went downstairs and let them believe the promises weren’t there.

It didn’t take long for them to reach for the pot.

One morning my mother-in-law came into the dining room and set a stack of legal folders on the marble in front of me, squaring the edges the way she squared everything.

“Sign these, Meredith,” Marguerite said.

I opened the top one slowly.

Medical authorizations.

A power of attorney.

And underneath, a formal agreement naming the Kingsley family estate as Micah’s primary legal residence.