We built a life that looked, from the outside, enviable in the well-lit, suburban way. A two-story house with cream siding and blue shutters. Hydrangeas along the walkway. A swing set in the backyard. A neighborhood where people waved from driveways and compared school district rankings over potluck casseroles. Mark worked in corporate sales for a medical supply company. I freelanced from home part time after Lily was born, taking bookkeeping clients and occasional design work when I could fit it between carpool lines and dentist appointments and the invisible labor that fills a mother’s days so completely she sometimes forgets she is allowed to call it work.
We were not glamorous. We were not dramatic. We were, I thought, steady.
The first crack I can name now came after Lily turned six.