And then a small hand grabbed my sleeve so hard I nearly stumbled into the cane.
“Sir?”
And what I saw nearly knocked me to the floor.
The voice was high and trembling, barely above a whisper.
I turned around slowly, my heart already doing something strange in my chest.
And what I saw nearly knocked me to the floor.
Instead, I found a thin girl in a faded school uniform. She was clutching a crumpled bill and a single can of beef stew.
“I’m sorry I grabbed you so hard,” she whispered. “I just didn’t want you to leave hungry.”
I stared at her. She couldn’t have been more than twelve.
Something cracked open inside me. Something that had been sealed shut since 1989.
“This is for you, sir. It’s beef stew. And here’s four dollars. It’s all I have, but you need it more.”
“Child,” I said carefully, “isn’t that your lunch money?”
She nodded, looking at her shoes.
“I saved it all week. But my mom always says we share what we have, even when it’s nothing.”
Something cracked open inside me. Something that had been sealed shut since 1989.
“What’s your name?” I asked.
She took my elbow like I was made of glass.
“Lily.”
She took my elbow like I was made of glass and guided me to a bench outside the store. Then she ran to the water fountain and came back with a paper cup, holding it steady while I pretended to drink. As she leaned close, I caught the embroidered school patch on her uniform.
“Where’s your mother now, Lily?”
“At work. She cleans offices at night. Sometimes during the day too, if they let her.”
I let her sit with me a while longer.
“And your father?”
“It’s just us.”
I let her sit with me a while longer. Then I told her I had somewhere to be, and I watched, from a careful distance, as she walked home to a small apartment above a laundromat near the bus depot.
That night, I told my lawyer to draw up new papers.
“Name?” he asked.
He called me back the next morning.
“Lily,” I said. “Twelve years old. Lives with her mother above the laundromat near the bus depot. Her school uniform had a crest from the academy near the store. Run the background. I want everything clean.”
He called me back the next morning.
“Sir, there’s a problem.”
“What kind of problem?”
“The mother. She works as a night cleaner at your corporate headquarters. And Derek has been building a file against her.”
I closed my eyes. Derek. Of course it was Derek.
I sat up straighter in my chair. “What file?”
