IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE there are orphans and widows, but there is no word for the parent who loses achild.

They bring her back down to us after the donated organs are removed. I am the last to go in. In the hallway,already, are Jesse and Zanne and Campbell and some of the nurses we’ve grown close to, and even JuliaRomano—the people who needed to say goodbye.

Brian and I walk inside, where Anna lies tiny and still on the hospital bed. A tube feeds down her throat, amachine breathes for her. It is up to us to turn it off. I sit down on the edge of the bed and pick up Anna’shand, still warm to the touch, still soft inside mine. It turns out that after all these years I have spentanticipating a moment like this, I am completely at a loss. Like coloring the sky in with a crayon; there is nolanguage for grief this big. “I can’t do this,” I whisper.

Brian comes up behind me. “Sweetheart, she’s not ............