The Man Who Entered Our Bedroom at 1:13 Every Night

to her mother while I snored two feet away.

“She asked if it hurt,” Karen said. “I told her a little.”

“And you left it there.”

“What was I supposed to do at two in the morning? Sit her down and explain oncology?”

“No. But something.”

Karen looked at me with pure exhaustion. “Something was all I had left most days.”

That shut me up.

I thought about the sleeping continue reading …