Minh walked over and squatted beside me, his thin arms picking up the smaller twigs. “Duc’s father came to school today for the festival. And Lan’s father brought her a new backpack. And Tuan’s father—”

“I know,” I interrupted gently. “I know all the other children have fathers.”

“So where’s mine?”

Ten years. A decade had passed since the day my world fell apart, and I still didn’t have an answer that wouldn’t break his heart the way mine had been broken.

“Your father…” I started, then stopped. How do you explain to a child that the man who helped create him vanished like smoke before he was born? How do you make sense of something that never made sense to begin with?

“Your father loved you very much,” I finally said, the same words I’d repeated countless times. “But he had to go away.”

“When is he coming back?”

“I don’t know, baby. I don’t know.”

The Beginning of Everything