During this same time, Juliet and I became closer than ever. Whether she knew it or not, I think she saved me. The sweet girl would bring me a cup of tea without asking if I wanted one, or she’d pick me flowers from the garden, knowing I was too tired to do it myself. That Mother’s Day, she gave me a card that said, “After intensive research and based on my own experiences, this fact cannot be denied: you are the best mother in the history of the world.” That was also the day Sadie cried and cried; she was teething, so I rubbed her gums, and she bit down hard, slicing my finger with her razor blade of a new tooth. My finger bled a shocking amount, and it throbbed for the rest of the day.

That about summed things up. I kept trying to get my second-born to love me, and everything I did was wrong, whereas my first daughter continued to adore and like me. I tried. I really did. You can’t compare your children, all the authorities said, and I tried not to. I wanted to make room for Sadie. I tried to. But John was her favorite, and my poor body was ravaged by the pregnancy and birth. While I had bounced back in weeks after Juliet, it took nearly a year before my incision stopped hurting, before I could pee normally again.

Decades later, when postpartum depression came into the social conversation, I recognized that I’d had it with Sadie. It didn’t solve anything, but it was good to know. But once again, something in me had been wrong. Always, always my fault.

As Sadie grew, our relationship didn’t change much. If she woke from a nightmare, she called out for Daddy, not Mommy. She wanted him to push her on the swing, him to take her to the library on Saturdays, him to make her macaroni and cheese. (They both thought Kraft was better than my homemade version, which I found ridiculous. If there’s one thing a Minnesotan knows, it’s how to make a baked dish with noodles in it, thank you.)

Juliet started high school when Sadie was two, and the dreaded countdown began for the time she would leave me. Every minute of those four years with her was precious, every drive, every morning when I made her breakfast, every weekend, every little moment we had together. Sadie would go to bed at seven or seven thirty—the earlier the better, as far as I was concerned. I let John read to her at night, telling myself it was only fair, since he’d missed out on those times with Juliet. It also gave me more time with Juliet, who told me about her classmates, her papers, which teachers were better, who was going to the spring dance.