*Whatever the documents say — whatever you decide to do with any of this — I want you to know that those afternoons were the best ones I had in a very long time.
You gave me a wedding.
You gave me a last name to carry out of this world.*
*You gave me more than you will ever know.*
*With all my love,*
*Eleanor*
I don't know how long I sat there.
The light changed.
The temperature dropped.
At some point I became aware that my face was wet.
I looked at the hospital record again.
The date.
The city.
The blank line where a father's name should have been.
I thought about the woman I had known for two years.
The way she laughed at her own jokes before she finished telling them.
The way she always asked about my week before I could ask about hers.
The way she had looked at me on our wedding day — not like a patient looking at a volunteer, but like something else entirely.
