Chapter 16: The Closing Date

I held the beige receiver away from my ear and looked at Jessa.

She had heard every word through the wire.

Her hand had gone flat across her stomach.

"Carlton," I said into the phone, "I'm a nurse. I know what a judge asks first."

"You don't know a thing about it."

"They ask who went to the appointments."

"They ask who sat in the ER while she bled."

"Mom has a lawyer."

"Then your mother's lawyer can explain a deed to a judge."

I hung the phone back on its hook, and the cord swung against the wall.

Jessa's aunt had her arms folded and her chin up.

"Nobody takes a child from this house," she said.

"He can try," Jessa whispered. "He's very good at trying."

The doorbell rang.

It rang twice, politely.

The aunt looked at me.

I went and opened the door.

Diane stood on the step in a camel coat with a gift basket on her arm.

There was a bow on the basket, and a white envelope tucked under the bow.

"Claire, sweetheart," she said. "What a surprise."

"Is it?"

"I came to bring my girl home."

She slid past me into the hall without being asked.

She went straight into the kitchen and set the basket on the Formica.

"Jessa, honey. Last night was a terrible misunderstanding. You were upset, and nobody blames you."

Jessa stood up.

She was shaking, but she stood.

"I'm not coming home."

"Of course you are. Carlton's beside himself."

"I'm not coming home, Diane."

Diane's voice stayed soft.

"After everything I did for you. I found you. Thirty-six years nobody wanted to look, and I looked."

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