‘How’s that?’
‘With Grace,’ she said, ‘it was like that. Not so bad, though. She was like six, when she started to get better. Dolls. When she didn’t get apple pie with the rest of us one time, she cried her heart out. It was like growing up all over again. Faster, I mean, but like travelling the same road again.’
‘You think he’s going to be like that?’
‘Isn’t he like a two-year-old?’
‘First I ever saw six foot tall.’
She snorted in half-pretended annoyance. ‘We’ll raise him up just like a child.’
He was quiet for a time. Then. ‘What’ll we call him?’
‘Not Jack,’ she said before she could stop herself.
He grunted an agreement. He didn’t know quite what to say then.
She said, ‘We’ll bide our time about that. He’s got his own name. It wouldn’t be right to put another to him. You just wait. He’ll get back to where he remembers it.’