And then I’m stumbling through the hall and tripping down the stairs, fighting a sudden wave of panic and fire and darkness before the fall air hits me, cold and exhilarating, like jumping into a lake in early spring, and I’m waving the documents at my mother’s concerned face in the car window, hoping she can’t tell just how close I was to losing my shit.

As we drive beneath the sprawling tree branches on my parents’ street, I’m hit with a warm wave of nostalgia. I’m seven, maybe eight. Summer tastes like honeysuckles and the promise of sugar-sweet ice pops and smells like sunscreen and mosquito-bite ointment. I’m lying on my belly at Whitney’s house, two doors down, looking at old photo albums, laughing at a picture of her brother half-naked in a high chair, covered in chocolate cake. There’s Whitney holding a balloon, licking an ice-cream cone, cradled in her mother’s arms. With every flick of the page she gets smaller, and I’m mesmerized by this backward glance through time. The memory flickers and then we’re racing, Whitney’s dark braids flap as we tear across the road. We squeal whenever a car peels around the bend. Cyclists and joggers yell us on, and we run faster. My shoelaces must come untied, because the next thing I know I’m flying over the sidewalk and blood is gushing from my knee. I’m not a crier. Never have been. Whitney, on the other hand, starts screaming. My father is out the door, off the front porch, and down the seven stone steps to the walkway before I can roll off my face to examine the damage. His mouth is twisting with fury. He shakes my arm: “You have to be careful, Marlitt.” He yells at Whitney, and she hightails it home. When I ask him about our family photos, he blanches and walks away. Her father will come over later that night, and then both fathers are shouting and Whitney and I aren’t allowed to play together anymore.

I sigh, and my mother turns her head, eyebrows raised.

“It’s only temporary,” she tells me.