Three pairs of socks.
When I asked why three, he looked almost offended.
“You don’t know what can happen with socks.”
I loved him for that.
I had grown up in a house where uncertainty was normal.
My father left when I was ten.
My mother, Evelyn, spent years expecting bad news before breakfast.
Nolan was the opposite.
He made plans.
And plans made me feel safe.
Which was why watching him leave Rosewood Medical Center minutes after our son’s birth felt so wrong.
Not dramatic.
Wrong.
Like finding a staircase where there had always been a wall.
