Most days you couldn’t see it.
Sometimes you could forget it was there.
But the structure had always been affected.
Sylvia was sixty-two.
She had been married to Ethan’s father, Gerald, for thirty-five years.
Gerald was kind, mild, and extremely skilled at remaining present without interfering with whatever Sylvia had decided should happen.
Sylvia had strong opinions about nearly everything.
But her strongest opinions concerned Ethan.
He was her only child.
He had been the center of her emotional world from the moment he was born.
She loved him deeply.
