Chapter 8 - Everyone Had One Piece
Maya met me at Rachel’s kitchen table.
She was twenty-two and looked as if she hadn’t slept.
“I should have called you,” she said.
“Tell me what happened.”
Noah had asked for Emma’s blanket at bedtime. Claire told him blankets were for babies.
When he cried, she’d said the words Maya still couldn’t repeat without stopping.
“I told her that was cruel,” Maya said. “She fired me right there.”
Claire had told me Maya canceled at the last minute.
She’d even shown me a message.
“She texted from my phone while I was getting my coat,” Maya said. “I didn’t know until later.”
“Why didn’t you contact me?”
“She said you agreed with her. That you were tired of people treating Noah like he was broken.”
I closed my eyes.
Another wall. Another person told a different story.
We gave Maya’s information to the officer who contacted me that morning.
Later, I took Noah to his pediatrician. Rachel came with us.
He had no serious physical injury from the cake. The doctor checked him gently, spoke with him without rushing, and helped us arrange support with a child therapist.
In the waiting room, Noah leaned against me.
“Am I sick?”
“No, buddy. We’re getting help because something scary happened.”
“Do I have to get a shot?”
“No shot today.”
He considered that.
“Then can Bear get checked?”
The nurse found a tiny bandage.
I almost cried watching her put it on the bear’s worn arm.
Outside, my phone lit up with a public post Claire had made.
A wedding photograph.
A caption about a troubled child, a cruel family, and a husband who had humiliated her.
She had posted before I could tell my closest friends what happened.
Underneath were comments calling her brave.
Then Ben called.
“Someone asked me to delete the footage.”
“Claire?”
“No.”
He hesitated.
“A man named Scott. He says he’s an attorney.”
“Is he?”
“I don’t know. But he said if the video gets out, you’ll regret what people learn about you.”
I looked through the car window at Noah, carefully buckling Bear into the seat beside him.
May you like
For a moment, all I could hear was my own breathing.
Then I told Ben, “Save that message too.”
