“He left anyway,” Diane said. “Eventually decided even providing wasn’t worth the effort. I promised myself, watching Ryan grow up, that I’d never let him become that same kind of absent, even in small ways. I suppose I missed some of the smaller ways along the road.”
I told her, carefully, about the beach trip, the exact words Ryan had used, “you haven’t earned one,” repeating in my head for days afterward like a bruise I kept accidentally pressing.
Diane was quiet for a long moment.
