“Grandma puts me in the freezer when I spill my juice,” my 7-year-old daughter sobbed in my arms. As I carried her to my heated truck, she gestured to a second, padlocked freezer hidden under my old boxes. “Don’t touch that one,” she whispered. “That’s where Grandpa went eight years ago…”

hands—a tall man and a little girl.

There were no shadows in the picture. No dark corners. No cold steel boxes.

I walked over, sat down beside her on the floor, and handed her a mug. “It’s beautiful, Iris. The brightest house I’ve ever seen.”

“I used all the warm colors,” she said proudly, taking a tiny sip of her cocoa. “Because warm colors mean nobody continue reading …