“Is this Ms. Nora Ellison?” a woman asked.

And when the next call came someday, as calls always do, it would not find me frozen by the past.

It would find me ready.

Not because I was brave every hour.

Not because I had forgiven every wound.

But because once, on the worst day of his life, a boy came looking for the lady with two eyes.

And I came.

And I stayed.

And in the end, that was how the family began.