I was thinking of writing a poem—just a list of my father’s smiles. But then I began to build in things around the list of smiles I had. A window. Cardboard. I really played around with the arrangement of the story. I felt like I could begin the story anywhere, put it out of order, and no matter how I arranged the details the story remained the same. Mom left. So I began with that. The narrator’s father is a stylish man.