Under the table, my hand tightened into a fist until my nails bit into my palm. I didn’t tell him that Lily wasn’t hiding the food out of jealousy. My six-year-old daughter, with her big, observant eyes and silent ways, wasn’t acting out. She was acting in defense. She was hiding the food because she had seen Daddy “seasoning” it when Mommy wasn’t looking.

Lily was sitting in the corner of the living room, pretending to color, but I saw her watching us. She was the ghost in our machine, the witness David arrogantly ignored because he thought children were stupid. But Lily wasn’t stupid. She was terrified.