Chapter 2 - WHAT LORNA THOUGHT SHE WAS OWEDMaya asked Lorna to sit in the family consultation room.
Lorna remained standing.
“I’m taking him home after you fix whatever he did.”
“We’re not at that stage yet.”
“I’m his guardian.”
“And he arrived here alone after midnight.”
Lorna folded her arms.
“He’s nine, not helpless.”
The answer made Maya pause.
She opened Noah’s registration record.
“Where do you live?”
“North Linden.”
More than three miles away.
In heavy rain.
Maya wrote it down.
Lorna saw her.
“Oh, come on. You think I sent him walking?”
“I haven’t said what I think.”
That seemed to irritate Lorna more.
The story came out in pieces.
Noah’s mother, Rachel, had died from complications following pneumonia when Noah was five. His father, Daniel Bennett, had raised him alone for nearly two years before being killed when a forklift overturned at a distribution warehouse.
After Daniel’s death, Noah moved into Lorna’s three-bedroom house.
Lorna was Daniel’s older sister.
She had a teenage son named Mason and worked payroll for an auto-parts supplier.
She had been approved as Noah’s kinship caregiver and later appointed guardian.
“What income does Noah receive?” Maya asked.
Lorna gave her a sharp look.
“Why?”
“Because you mentioned his support payment.”
“There’s a county kinship subsidy. And his Social Security survivor benefit.”
“How much?”
“I don’t memorize every number.”
Maya looked at the woman who had mentioned the check before asking whether the child was hurt.
“Approximately.”
“Enough to help with groceries and utilities.”
Lorna sat at last.
Then, as if she needed Maya to understand something, she said, “Daniel left a mess. Everybody remembers him like he was some saint because he died young. Nobody remembers who covered his electric bill when Rachel was sick. Nobody remembers who paid his mortgage twice.”
That was the first time her anger sounded older than Noah.
Inside the exam room, Dr. Harris explained that pediatric gastroenterology wanted another image to confirm the location and type of the objects.
Noah listened without asking whether the coins would hurt him.
Instead he asked, “Can she come in?”
“Your aunt?”
“No.”
Relief crossed his face when Dr. Harris answered.
Carla brought warm socks and a blanket.
Noah accepted the blanket but tucked two packages of crackers beneath it.
Carla noticed.
She pretended not to.
Twenty minutes later, Noah slowly ate half of one cracker.
“Do you get stomachaches a lot?” Dr. Harris asked.
“Sometimes.”
“After eating?”
“Mostly when I don’t.”
Dr. Harris stopped writing.
“When you don’t eat?”
Noah stared at the cracker.
“At home, when are you allowed to eat?”
“There’s dinner.”
“And breakfast?”
“If there’s time.”
“Lunch?”
“School.”
“What about weekends?”
Noah became interested in a loose thread on the blanket.
Dr. Harris changed direction.
“The money you swallowed. You said it belonged to you.”
Noah nodded.
“What were you going to do with it?”
Noah looked toward the closed door.
“I needed enough for the bus.”
“Where were you trying to go?”
The answer came quietly.
“Mr. Cole’s.”
“Who’s Mr. Cole?”
“My dad’s friend.”
Dr. Harris waited.
Noah rubbed his thumb against the cracker wrapper.
“Dad told me if I ever really needed something and Aunt Lorna wouldn’t listen, I could find Marcus.”
That sentence was still settling when Maya entered.
She had another piece of information.
“Noah,” she said gently, “your aunt says you disappeared around eleven-thirty.”
He looked confused.
“I left before ten.”
Maya and Dr. Harris exchanged a glance.
Almost two hours were missing from Lorna’s version.
May you like
Then Noah added something neither of them expected.
“She knew I was leaving.”
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