They needed present. They needed reliable. They needed a grown man who would still be standing in the doorway tomorrow and the day after and the year after, imperfect and tired and there.

And being there I could do.

Being there was the one thing I had refused to do for three years, and I was going to spend the rest of my life doing it, badly and completely, starting that sleepless first night.

Chapter 5 — Open Doors

That first night I learned the first thing about what safety looked like to them, and it was doors.

I showed Ollie his room, the bed I’d made up with dinosaur sheets I’d guessed at, and he didn’t look at the bed or the little lamp or the toys I’d set out.