Happiness had settled into my life so gently that sometimes I was afraid to breathe too loudly, afraid I might startle it away. 

Soren came to our house often now. Not out of obligation, not as a guest who needed to be entertained, but as someone who belonged. He sat with my mother in the evenings, listening to her stories with patience. 

He walked through the rooms as though they were already part of his future. And when it was just the two of us, we talked endlessly—about the wedding, ...