Then — and this was the part I had made sure to leave in, the part that mattered more to me than all the rest — the way he had spoken about my children. Those kids.

She’s desperate to feel secure. The category.

The leverage.

The baggage.

All of it, in his own voice, in his own words, playing in a decorated hall in front of everyone who had come to celebrate our love.

I had thought carefully about that, in the editing — about how much to play, and which parts.

I could have played only the financial lines, the house and the savings, the plainest evidence of the scheme, and it would have been enough to end him in that room.

But I chose to include the part about my children, and I chose it deliberately, and I want to explain why, because it is the closest thing I have to a reason for the whole public spectacle of that day.