I sat down on the curb of the school parking lot because my legs no longer felt reliable.
Simone sat beside me. Micah stood in front of both of us, looking lost in the particular way ten-year-olds look when the adults around them are clearly having the biggest conversation of their lives and nobody has explained the rules yet.
“Grandma,” he said quietly. “Is she nice?”
I looked at Simone, at the same crooked, hesitant half-smile Micah gave me every time he was about to ask for something he wasn’t sure he deserved.
“Yes,” I said. “I think she might be one of the nicest people we’ve never met.”
Simone laughed, a wet, broken sound, and reached toward her bag one more time. She pulled out a photograph, worn soft at the corners: a boy in a swim team jacket, dark hair dripping, grinning at whoever held the camera like he’d just won something.
