I placed one candle in it.
Then I ate it myself.
I could almost hear her complaining that I had taken too large a bite.
PART 22 — NOAH’S DINOSAURS
Noah’s fifth birthday had passed only months after the crash.
I had spent that day in bed.
On what would have been his sixth, I went to the science museum.
Alone at first.
Then Melissa asked whether she could join me.
I almost said no.
Instead I said:
“Ten o’clock. Dinosaur hall.”
She arrived early.
We stood beneath an enormous fossil skeleton.
“What was his favorite again?”
“Ankylosaurus.”
“I looked it up.”
“That sounds suspiciously responsible.”
She smiled.
At the museum shop she bought a small ankylosaurus.
Not for me.
For herself.
“I barely knew him,” she said.
The honesty hurt.
“I want to remember that.”
We did not pretend she had been a wonderful aunt.
We did not rewrite history because remorse made it uncomfortable.
She had missed too much.
Now she was trying to stop missing what remained.
PART 23 — ETHAN’S PARENTS
One of my greatest fears was that money would complicate my relationship
with Margaret and Robert.
So I addressed it directly.
We met with separate counsel concerning any estate interests and
