That night, I didn’t go home right
away.
I sat in my car in the hospital parking garage, gripping the steering wheel.
For the first time since the divorce, I let myself remember our marriage
without editing out the good parts.
Sophie dancing barefoot in our first apartment because the radio played her favorite song.
Sophie crying when we assembled a crib too early, then laughing because I had attached one side backward.
Sophie standing in the kitchen with flour on her cheek, insisting that pancakes counted as dinner.
Sophie asleep on the couch, one hand resting on her stomach during those brief weeks when we believed the future was arriving.
I had loved her.
I still loved her.
But love alone had not made me brave.
The following days became a quiet lesson in showing up.
I helped Linda coordinate appointments. I drove to Sophie’s apartment to collect clothes and discovered how small her new
