My parents refused to care for my younger kids while I tended to my oldest with leukemia; I called my ex-husband, but he said: “You’re just a poor writer, deal with it”

you is how Kora was.

She stayed bossy.

She stayed funny.

Two days before the end, she made me promise with absolute seriousness that Wyatt would not get her secret candy stash under her bed because he did not appreciate good candy and would chew it wrong.

I promised.

I would have promised her the moon.

She asked strange, clear questions near the end, the questions children sometimes ask once they have moved ahead of the adults.

She asked whether it would hurt.

I told her the truth.

The doctors