Chapter 15: The Assembly

Hannah's POV

I went to the assembly with my son strapped to my chest, and Ben did not try to stop me.

He drove me instead, and he carried the diaper bag, and he said only, "I'll be at the back."

My son was six days old.

He weighed five pounds two ounces, and the doctor had let us take him home on Wednesday.

The school gym smelled of floor wax and wet coats.

Two hundred parents sat on folding chairs facing a stage hung with paper turkeys.

Maddie's class stood on the risers in white shirts.

She found me at once and waved with her whole arm.

I sat down in the third row, on the aisle.

The principal came to the microphone and thanked everyone for coming.

She did not look at me, and she did not look at the program in her hand either.

She looked like a woman who had read it that morning and hated it.

"Our first parent speaker," she said, and stopped.

A woman I did not know stood up at the side of the stage with a clipboard.

"The PTA put this together before the, ah, reassignment," she said. "We can skip it."

"No, please," said a voice from the middle of the gym.

Colleen stood up.

She wore a soft blue sweater and a small gold cross, and her hair was down around her shoulders.

She walked to the stage steps, and nobody stopped her.

I felt my stomach go tight, and my son stirred against my chest.

"Thank you," Colleen said, and took the microphone from the PTA mother's hand.

"I'll be brief. I know many of you have seen things online."

She looked out over the rows with wet eyes.

"I'm not here to hurt anyone. I'm here because my daughter has lost her school, her friends and her home."

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