My parents kicked me out one day after my C-section—with my newborn in my arms. Then my husband pulled up, looked at my face, and made one phone call that changed everything.

The dangerous thing about long deprivation is how little hope it takes to make you reckless.

For a while things seemed manageable. Mitchell hovered in the good way, learning everything he could about pregnancy nutrition and infant sleep without turning Wendy’s body into a project. They bought a used dresser for the nursery because the budget was tight. Mitchell painted it white in the garage one Saturday afternoon, getting streaks on his forearms and insisting he could absolutely assemble furniture without instructions. He could not. Wendy sat cross-legged nearby, laughing so hard she had to put one hand over her barely-there bump.

They lived in a small rental house on the eastern edge of Raleigh, the kind of place with slightly uneven floors, a narrow galley kitchen, and a patchy backyard that Mitchell kept insisting would look better after he aerated it. It was not glamorous. But it was theirs in the real sense, the sense built by daily acts and private jokes and the worn softness of a couch chosen together.