My father killed himself, drowned in the lake at the bottom of the quarry, the week after my mother died. His pockets were full of rocks, and one lonely shell. He left me a note, in his bag on the shore, and a request for his ashes to be scattered on the sea.

Once, before she was my mother, my mother played violin in a local orchestra. She kept her instrument, took it out at holiday parties, her hands gliding the bow over the strings with magical quickness, chin proud, elbow bent just so. In fourth grade, our school offered free music lessons to anyone who wanted them,…

I grew up in a house that sang. Its walls, wrinkled and grey, blended into the overcast sky like an old photograph left too long in the sun. To the neighbours, it was just another tired building, its shutters hanging loosely, its roof patched in places where the wind had been cruel. To me, the…