"I almost left."
"What stopped you?"
"I imagined them getting old enough to ask why Grandma never came."
I looked at the nursery door.
"And what would you have said?"
She shook her head.
"Nothing that wouldn't have hurt them."
For a long time, we sat without speaking.
Then I told her something I hadn't admitted to anyone.
"Sometimes I wish Mary were here so badly I feel guilty looking at the girls."
Her mother listened.
"I'll be holding one, and I'll think Mary should be doing this. She should be here for the first smiles. She should know which one hates a cold bottle."
My throat closed.
"And then I think about what I said at the hospital."
"Mary asked you."
"I agreed."
"Because you trusted her."
I shook my head.
"I keep thinking I traded her for them."
Her mother reached across the table.
I pulled my hand away.
Not because I hated her.
Because I needed to say the rest.
