Chapter 2 - The Room at the End of the Hall
The urgent-care clinician checked Emma's breathing, examined her eyes, and carefully asked about the frosting and the frightened coughing.
Emma had no immediate serious injury, but the doctor documented the incident and recommended follow-up because food had briefly covered her nose and mouth.
"Will my face always smell like cake?" Emma asked.
"No, honey," Andrew said.
"We're going to wash it out of your hair."
She looked at his hands.
"Are you going to hit people again?"
The question landed harder than anyone's anger at the party.
"No," he said.
"I was wrong to hit Clara, even after what she did. You deserve adults who keep you safe."
A social worker arrived and spoke first to Emma with Andrew nearby, then separately to Andrew and Zoe.
Andrew described his slap without minimizing it.
He asked for help creating a safe plan rather than an easy way out of consequences.
That evening, he drove Emma to the small brick house of Tessa Lane, the sister of Emma's late mother, Nora.
Tessa had a spare bedroom, a steady voice, and a drawer full of pajamas she'd kept for sleepovers.
"You'll both stay here tonight," she said.
"We can figure out tomorrow tomorrow."
Emma clung to her father's sleeve.
"Does the baby get my room now?"
"No one is taking your room tonight," Andrew said.
"Or your desk."
Emma's eyes filled.
"Clara says Mommy's things make the house sad."
Tessa looked away to hide her anger.
The desk had been Nora's first, a little maple writing desk with a star carved into one leg.
Nora had died when Emma was two, leaving behind stories, photographs, and a quilt sewn during chemotherapy appointments.
At midnight Zoe sent pictures of six flattened moving boxes, each labeled in Clara's handwriting.
One read EMMA - TO STORAGE.
The next read NORA - DISCARD.
May you like
Underneath came a message.
"Andrew, those aren't the first boxes I've seen. I think someone already took the desk's bottom drawer."
