I married a man in prison for money. Three years later his conviction was overturned — and eight days after he came home he put a black box on the kitchen table and said, “Now it’s my turn.”

And my brother — who was thirteen when it started and who has no memory of any of this happening around him — said: “So he paid for me before he knew you.”

And I said yes.

And Theo said: “For two years.”

And I said yes.

And then that boy said: “Wren. Why did he keep paying for me after you married him? He already had you.”

And I did not have an answer for my own brother in that kitchen.

I sat there and did not have one, and I had to go away and find it, and it took me about four days.

The answer is in the ledger.

The last entry in that notebook is the autumn term of 2021.

Which is the term he was arrested in. The column for that term is filled in and the one underneath it is ruled and empty.

He could not keep paying for that program after that.