“Are you sad?” Ben asked, surprising her, and she swallowed the impulse to cry, though surely he was used, by now, to the sight of her tears. “Of course not,” she said into his head. “Mama’s so happy.” She felt wisps of his hair between her lips. She had the urge sometimes, fierce and instinctual, to eat him. “Sweet, my sweet, you make Mama so, so happy.”
