“ ‘Eeny-meeny-miny-moe,’ Jacqueline began reciting, pointing her finger in one direction, and then the other. ​ ‘My mother said to pick the very best one and you are it,’ Jacqueline continued in a whisper, ultimately pointing her unsteady finger toward Sebastian, who slept peacefully in his toddler bed. Clumsily and nearly disastrously, Jacqueline climbed into the toddler bed as best as she could, cradling her son in her cramped arms while her legs hung off the edges of the bed. It should have been obvious that she couldn’t fit, not just in the bed, but in that role. She should have known that even one child was more than she could handle. But in her broken world, there was nothing wrong with staying attached to something you were supposed to outgrow. Even if this habit deformed you, even if your legs dangled or your neck cramped, you were still allowed to live in that stifling world, and so you would; there were no other options that sounded decent anyway. And so she slept, breathing softly onto the nape of the neck of her elected son while little Jake, a stranger now, slept restlessly, jerking around as if that might make the crumpled newspaper beneath him feel more tolerable.