At the time, I was thirty-four, working three days a week as a dental receptionist and spending the rest of my time pretending I had any control over my seven-year-old son.
I didn’t.
Caleb had opinions about everything.
He thought broccoli was “tree punishment.”
He believed socks were optional unless there was snow on the ground.
And he had once written a note to our mailman apologizing because our dog “had emotional problems about federal employees.”
But underneath all that seven-year-old chaos, Caleb had always had an unusually tender heart.
Especially when it came to the little girl next door.
Our neighbor, Jenna Brooks, moved into the rental house beside ours when her daughter, Sophie, was five months old.
Jenna was twenty-eight, quiet, hardworking, and permanently exhausted.
Sophie had been born with Down syndrome.
Jenna was raising her alone.
I never asked for the whole story about Sophie’s father. Jenna once told me only that he had left during the pregnancy and had never shown any interest in returning.
