Chapter 13: Greyport Speaks

The Greyport civic center held eight hundred people, and all of them had come to watch my family.

I stood in the doors at the back with my hood up and the dish towel inside my coat.

Channel 4 had built a stage under the basketball hoops.

A banner hung behind it in white letters: GREYPORT SPEAKS. Under that, smaller: Families of the Lost.

On the big screen above the stage, a clip played on a loop.

It was the charity hall, my plate, my fork, and my throat moving.

The sound was off. Half the room watched it with their hands over their mouths.

I saw a plain girl eating pumpkin pasta.

They saw something else, and I had never been allowed to look.

I took the aisle on the left, where the shadows were deepest.

The front row had a strip of tape across it that said FAMILIES.

Kari sat at the far end with her track jacket folded on the seat beside her.

She didn't turn her head.

I sat down on the other side of the jacket, and she kept her eyes on the stage.

"I'm not saving it for you," she said. "I'm saving it so nobody else sits there."

"Okay."

"They're going to ask for it, Nina."

"I know."

"Don't do anything stupid."

"I'm going to do something very stupid," I said. "Thank you for the seat."

The host came out in a blue suit and thanked everyone for being brave.

He introduced the district attorney, a broad man with silver hair, who spoke about justice for six minutes and never once looked at me.

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