Casey stood up. I think she was going to leave. But my uncle Brian said "Sit down" in a voice I had not heard him use since I was seven years old and I had broken his garage window with a baseball. Casey sat down. And then my uncle Brian looked at me, and then at my mother, and he said, "Ellen. I think it's time." My mother, still on her knees on the floor, made a sound that was not a word. Somewhere between a laugh and a sob. And my aunt Linda walked over, helped her up, and led her into the kitchen. Brian gestured for me to follow. I walked through that kitchen doorway on the longest three seconds of my life. My mother was sitting at the kitchen island. Her makeup was running. Brian closed the kitchen door behind us. And he said, "Your father isn't dead. He lives in Tucson. His name isn't Nicholas. And your mother has been lying to you for twenty-seven years."