He watched the young woman hoist the baby onto her lap and clean his chocolatey fingers one at a time by putting them in her mouth.
For years he chose to console himself with the thought that the rot set in when Michael first met Charlotte. It was a narrative he could tell to colleagues and friends almost without flinching. Kids! You do your best for them and then–!
He remembered the phone call from Sally: the first intimation of catastrophe. He was in his office, the windows were open and a summer breeze was batting the vertical blinds against each other. He was halfway to the filing cabinet when the phone rang and he picked up the receiver absently, riffling through the files with his free hand.
Colin?
He remembered the sight of his hand resting on the drawer as if he had momentarily
