…I give birth to my son, one week early; when he scores one for reflex irritability, when he grimaces to show his disapproval at being rushed out into the world; when I buy my daughter a puzzle the day I return from hospital; when she tosses it away, demanding I take her new-born brother back to hospital where he can cry until he grows up; when my cancer-sick mother gives my son one bath, her bald head hovering over the blue tub; when I lie on my side, too sore and swollen to breathe; when, at night, I nibble on half-melted chocolate, despite breastfeeding, and watch gay porn; when I start a blog to legitimise my craving for chocolate, edgy movies, and weird books; when I email my friend Andreea to tell her about my recurring dream—pink-eyed, albino squirrels pulling at my leg; when I wake up to a sudden thump in the middle of the night to find my mother on the floor in a puddle of piss; when a transatlantic former lover contacts me on social media; when news of Michael Jackson’s death fills every screen, paper, and mouth; when I go to vote for the European Parliament and recognise the name of a girl I went to high school with; when I decide not to cast her my vote because she looks fresh, showered, and carefree; when, mid-July, my husband leaves on a business trip; when I cry and beg him not to; when he comforts me and whispers he’ll be back in a wink; when we move to my grandmother’s house in the countryside—me, my dying mother, my infant son, and toddler daughter; when our two dogs there are crawling with fleas; when my mother stops walking; when the nights are hefty with the scent of sweet tobacco; when my mother calls my name in the middle of the night and begs for a cigarette; when the next day she calls me by another’s name and accuses me of stealing her smokes; when my daughter, out of love, chokes a duckling to death and hides it in her brother’s pram; when I start giving my mother morphine shots; when my husband calls to check on us and reminds me he is on his way; when skittering mice in the attic sound like giants; when my grandmother asks me if we should feed my mother the red berries from the shrub in the yard; when I begin to fear letting my mother out of my sight; when I doze off and let my daughter out of my sight; when she emerges from the hen coop and tells me she has been laying an egg; when the sofa, plush as a mitten, holds my aching body, no questions asked; when a baby owl hoots every night outside the open window and wakes up my son; when it takes me two hours of holding and soothing to put him down again; when I crash next to him in the wee hours; when the dream returns—the albino squirrels are in cahoots with the owl to get the mice; when the small scrabble of claws against wood feels vindicating; when my mother no longer remembers pain, morphine, herself; when the three of us sleep on the couch for days, her hissing breath clicking like a metronome, no music; when I wake up to my husband’s kind face and the sound of things breaking; when I know, when I cannot, that I never again want to be broken.