Chapter 20 - A Place at the Table
Sol's six-page letter arrived in shaky handwriting. He wrote about the checkers board, the men who had stood up, and the man he had killed forty years earlier.
He did not ask Owen to call him a hero.
He asked whether the boy had gone back to school.
Owen wrote in return. He told Sol that algebra was still terrible, his best friend kept borrowing his headphones, and his mother had bought a ridiculous yellow couch because she said their old apartment needed some sunshine. Andrew now worked part-time as a building inspector. No more late-night prison calls or vanishing invoices.
Recovery was slow. Owen still sat facing the door. Some nights he woke from dreams of orange fabric and wet rice, unsure which side of a locked room he was on. A counselor helped. His parents stopped asking him to be brave on command.
On the first anniversary of Andrew's return, the Finches invited a few friends to dinner. Iris cooked roast chicken, green beans, and rice. Andrew set three water glasses on the table. Owen noticed the fourth plate beside the window.
"Who's that for?" he asked.
"For the people who helped us get home," Iris said. "Nobody's sitting there tonight. I just didn't want to forget them."
Owen thought of Sol, Harper, Grant, Voss, even Marcus. They hadn't all done the right thing. Some had done terrible things and finally told the truth. Remembering the difference mattered.
After dinner, Andrew brought out an old checkers set. All the pieces were there. He looked at Owen across the board.
"You ready?"
"I beat you last time."
"You got lucky."
Owen grinned and moved his first piece.
Outside, a car passed. A door closed somewhere down the street. Owen heard it and kept playing.
He had entered Greywater wearing a prisoner's uniform, but he had never belonged there. Greer had used him to watch who would protect a frightened boy. Instead, the boy had seen the truth the adults were trying to hide.
Now he was fifteen years old, at home with his family, and no one was asking him to identify an enemy or memorize an exit.
May you like
For the first time in a long while, Owen was hungry.
He went back to the kitchen for another plate.
