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gRaCeFULLY

SEPTEMBER 5
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Because there are 176 definitions for the word loser on urbandictionary.com.
Don’t Be a Statistic

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Hey bitches!

Ah, the beginning of another school year. And I’m back with all the shit that’s not fit to print...

So while you’ve all been whiling away the summer in Southampton, or on Nantucket or in the South of France, perfecting your tennis game or your pas de deux, or training for your first marathon, or basking in your latest chess championship, I’ve spent the summer keeping track of the back and forth of our dear faculty members. Mr. Zaritski went out to UC Berkeley to teach at a science camp for crazy-smart kids. Word has it the parents had him fired week two because he smelled. Mrs. Pearl took a Latin lover and learned to pole dance in Miami. Kidding. She didn’t actually have a lover, of course. Who would ever want to sleep with her?

Ah, and sweet delicious Mr. Woodhouse. Who wouldn’t have wanted to see him in a Speedo somewhere? Alas, his whereabouts lo these sultry months is unknown, though I have it on good authority that he spent at least one long weekend snuggled up with our beloved English prof Liv. To which I say, bravo.

As for all of you, I’ll be covering a summer wrap-up as the updates flow in over the next few days—and do send them along to [email protected]. Because here we are, another year where every loser has the chance to finally be cool and the fat kids might turn up skinny.

And the same old questions: Will lovely little Dylan ever come clean about who she’s screwing? Will Heather and Rachel ever admit they’re screwing each other? Will Zadie stay out of jail long enough to graduate? Which senior girl will our resident sophomore hottie Carter sleep with first? And who is this Ian Greene and is he as sizzlin’ as his meet book pictures suggest? Outlook doubtful says my own personal eight ball. But y’all will be the first to know.

In the meantime, keep those new shoes shiny and those smiles bright. And buckle up. Because it’s going to be one hell of a ride...

Amelia

SEPTEMBER 14, 7:37 AM

AMELIA
when did u know?

BEN
know what?

AMELIA
that you liked boys?

BEN
idk, always I guess

AMELIA
no way

BEN
it’s true, seriously

AMELIA
and you just told everybody

BEN
pretty much; who cares what people think

AMELIA
I can’t imagine being that sure about anything. or that brave.

BEN
u might surprise yourself

AMELIA
Nah

BEN
u r stronger than you think

AMELIA
thx. what wld I do w/o u to pump me up?

BEN
die? I like to think lives depend on me

AMELIA
ha ha. when are we going to hang out 4 real?

BEN
this isn’t real?

AMELIA
u know what I mean

BEN
I might come to NYC in a few weeks; my dad’s going on a business trip

AMELIA
and I’d get to see you?

BEN
totally

AMELIA
OMG! Seriously? I can’t wait!!!

Kate

OCTOBER 24

Kate knew Victor wasn’t happy, even before she looked up from her notes to see the anger settling over his face in a heavy cloud. The room was silent, everyone—five lawyers from Slone, Thayer; ten from Associated Mutual Bank—waiting for him to say something. Instead, Victor leaned back in his conference room chair, hands folded neatly in his lap. With his salt-and-pepper hair and perfectly tailored suit, he looked handsome and dignified, despite his obvious annoyance.

Amid the uncomfortable quiet, Kate’s stomach growled. She cleared her throat and shifted in her chair, hoping no one had heard. She’d been too nervous this morning to eat. There’d been the meeting, but there’d also been the argument she’d been bracing to have with Amelia. The argument had never materialized. Instead, Amelia had left for school with a smile and a cheerful wave, leaving Kate late for work and with an excess of unused adrenaline.

Kate glanced longingly at the endless array of bagels and fruit and sweets laid out on the conference room sideboard. But when you were running a client meeting in the place of Jeremy Firth, the beloved head of litigation at Slone, Thayer, you didn’t get up to grab a snack in the middle of it.

“You do realize,” Victor said, pointing at Kate, “that complying with this subpoena will nullify any later objections.”

“I understand your frustration, Victor,” Kate said calmly. “But the SEC is within its rights to—”

“Within its rights?” Victor snapped. “Overcompensating is more like it.”

Kate held Victor’s stare, which had morphed into something more of a glare. Vacillating now, even in the slightest, would be fatal. Victor would surely demand to see Jeremy, and while Kate might be a partner, she was still a junior one. She needed to be able to handle this on her own.

“And what about merit? Doesn’t that—” Before Victor could finish his thought, the phone in the conference room rang, startling everyone. Rebecca, the junior associate, dutifully hustled to answer it as Victor turned back to Kate. “I want our objections made part of the official record, and I want a budget for this whole mess before anyone opens a single box of documents. Do that and you’ve got your document collection, agreed?”

As though Kate would be pocketing the extra firm earnings herself. In fact, she wouldn’t benefit at all, beyond Jeremy’s appreciation. That wasn’t inconsequential, of course. Remaining one of Jeremy’s favored disciples mattered, a lot.

“Absolutely, Victor,” Kate said. “We’ll certainly do our best to—”

“Excuse me, Kate,” said a voice in her ear. When Kate glanced up, Rebecca looked petrified to be interrupting. “Sorry, but your secretary’s on the phone. She says there’s a call you need to take.”

Kate felt her face flush. Taking a call in the middle of a meeting with Victor Starke was even worse than grabbing a bagel. Kate’s secretary, Beatrice, would never have interrupted that kind of meeting, but she was out sick. Kate had told her replacement not to disturb her unless it was an absolute emergency, but the girl had had such a blank look on her face that Kate was convinced she was high. Unfortunately, refusing the call wasn’t an option either. Kate was waiting to hear back from a judge’s clerk about her application for a temporary restraining order for another client.

“Excuse me, for one moment, please,” Kate said, trying to make it seem as though the interruption was all very expected. “I’ll just be a second.”

The room was quiet as she made her way over to pick up the receiver. She could feel everyone staring at her. Luckily, as she pressed down on the flashing Hold button, the conversation behind her finally picked back up. Victor’s associates laughed obediently, probably at one of his jokes.

“This is Kate Baron.”

“Yes, Ms. Baron,” said the woman on the other end. “This is Mrs. Pearl, the dean of students at Grace Hall.”

A call she needed to take. How could her daughter not have even crossed her mind?

“Is Amelia okay?” Kate’s heart had picked up speed.

“Yes, yes, she’s fine,” Mrs. Pearl said, with a hint of annoyance. “But there has been an incident. Amelia’s been suspended for three days, effective immediately. You’ll need to come down and sign an acknowledgment form and take her home.”

“Suspended? What do you mean?”

Amelia had never been in trouble in her entire life. Her teachers called her a delight—bright, creative, thoughtful, focused. She excelled in athletics and was involved in every extracurricular activity under the sun. She volunteered once a month at CHIPS, a local soup kitchen, and regularly helped out at school events. Suspended from school? No, not Amelia. Despite Kate’s crushing work hours, she knew her daughter. Really knew her. There had been a mistake.

“Yes, Amelia has been suspended for three days,” Mrs. Pearl repeated, as though that answered the question of why. “For obvious reasons, we can only release her to a parent or guardian. Is that going to be a problem, Ms. Baron, for you to come and pick her up? We are aware that you work in Manhattan and that Amelia’s father is unavailable. But unfortunately, school policy is school policy.”

Kate tried not to feel defensive. She wasn’t even sure that it was judgment she was hearing in Mrs. Pearl’s voice. But Kate had suffered her share of uncomfortable questions, quizzical looks, and thinly veiled disapproval over the years. Her own parents still seemed to regard her decision to carry her unplanned pregnancy to term while still in law school as an especially depraved form of criminal insanity. The decision had certainly been out of character. Her whole life, Kate had always done the right thing at the right time, at least in all respects other than with men. The truth was, with men, Kate’s judgment had always been somewhat flawed. Keeping her baby had not been a decision Kate had made lightly, though, nor was it one she regretted.

“I’ll come right now, immediately. But can you at least tell me what she—” Kate paused, the lawyer in her suddenly aware that she should choose her words carefully. She wasn’t about to admit her daughter’s guilt. “What is Amelia accused of doing exactly?”

“I’m afraid disciplinary issues can’t be discussed by telephone,” Mrs. Pearl said. “There are confidentiality rules, procedures set in place. I’m sure you understand. Mr. Woodhouse, the headmaster, can provide you with details when you arrive. Which will be when exactly?”

Kate looked down at her watch. “I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”

“If twenty minutes is the best you can do,” Mrs. Pearl said, sounding as if she really wanted to say something far less accommodating. “I suppose that will be fine.”

 

Twenty minutes had been a vast overstatement. Victor had balked, loudly, when Kate tried to end the meeting early. In the end, she’d had no choice but to call Jeremy.

“I hate to do this,” she said to him in the hallway outside the conference room. And she did hate leaving. It was something that childless and long-divorced Daniel—her ultracompetitive former law school classmate, now fellow junior partner—would never have done, even if he’d been hemorrhaging internally. “But Amelia’s school called. I have to go pick her up.”

“Not a problem. In fact, you’ve just saved me from having to meet with Vera and the contractors at the new apartment. I’d take a client meeting with Attila the Hun over conversations about load-bearing walls any day,” Jeremy said, with one of his trademark smiles. He ran a hand over his prematurely silver hair. He was tall and handsome and, as usual, looked elegant in his pink-striped shirt. “Is everything all right?”

“I don’t know,” Kate said. “Apparently Amelia’s gotten into some kind of trouble, which doesn’t make sense. She doesn’t get into trouble.”

“Amelia? I’m fresh off singing her praises in that recommendation for the summer program at Princeton, so I may be biased, but I certainly don’t buy it.” Jeremy put a sympathetic hand momentarily on Kate’s shoulder and smiled again. “You know these private schools. They blame first, ask questions later. Whatever happened, I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation.”

And just like that, Kate felt a little better. That was Jeremy, always with the perfect empathetic aside. It came across as genuine, too, even for Kate, who should have known better.

“Victor isn’t happy,” she said, gesturing toward the closed conference room door. “I feel like I’m throwing you to the wolves a bit.”

“Don’t worry.” Jeremy waved a nonchalant hand. He could work until dawn, head into court with a losing case to confront an agitated adversary and a dissatisfied client all at once, and never lose his we’re-all-friends-here air. “I can handle Victor Starke. You go take care of Amelia.”

Kate opted for the subway to avoid Midtown traffic, but she was still forty-five minutes late when the number 2 train lurched to an unexplained halt just before Nevins Street. Fifty, fifty-five minutes late, that’s what she’d end up being by the time she got to Grace Hall. If she was lucky. Surely the school would take it as a sign of her poor parenting. Mother late, derelict child. It was an exceedingly direct line.

And the more Kate thought about it, the more she was convinced that whatever Amelia was accused of doing must have been bad. Grace Hall prided itself on being liberal, open-minded, student-driven. Founded two hundred years earlier by a group of New York City intellectuals—playwrights, artists, and politicians—the school was revered for its excellent academics and unparalleled arts program. While it was often spoken about alongside the old vanguard of Manhattan private schools—Dalton, Collegiate, Trinity—Grace Hall was in Brooklyn, and so came with a more bohemian pedigree. As such, the school shunned textbooks and standardized tests alike, in favor of experiential learning. Given the school’s dearth of formal rules, Kate could not imagine what a student would have to do to warrant suspension.

Suddenly, the train hissed and sputtered forward a few feet, before jerking again to a halt. Kate checked her watch. One hour and five minutes late, at least. Still four stops away. Goddamnit. She was always late, for everything. She stood up and went to hover near the subway door, doubt creeping up on her.

Recently, Amelia had seemed distracted, even a little moody. She was fifteen, and moods were a part of being a teenager, but it did seem like more than just that. There had been Amelia’s questions about her dad, for instance. Apparently, Kate’s stock explanation for why she didn’t have a daddy—that, after a single brief encounter, he’d gone off to teach children in Ghana and had never returned—was no longer holding water. There’d also been Amelia asking to go on that absurd semester-abroad program just the morning before.

“Mom, can’t you just stay and listen to me for one minute right now?”

Amelia had been leaning with her arms crossed against the kitchen counter in their narrow brownstone. With her long blond hair falling in waves over her shoulders and her miraculous eyes—one blue, one hazel—glinting in the warm morning light, Amelia had looked so much older, and taller, than she had only the day before. With Kate’s high cheekbones and heart-shaped face, Amelia was a beautiful girl. Sexy now, too, in her low-rise jeans and fitted tank top. Thankfully, she was also still a bit of a tomboy.

“Yes, Amelia, I can listen, for a minute,” Kate had said, trying not to lose her patience. From the sour look on her daughter’s face, the Thanksgiving trip to Bermuda Kate’d just suggested had been akin to offering up a weekend of dental work. “I’m always here to listen.”

“I want to spend next semester in Paris,” Amelia said.

“Paris?” Kate jammed her laptop and a handful of files into her bag, then resumed her search for her phone, which she thought she’d left on the counter. Kate ran a hand over her hair as Amelia stared at her. It was still wet, and yet she could have sworn she’d dried it. “For a whole semester? And Paris is so far away.”

Despite Kate’s best intentions, she was getting aggravated. It was hard not to see it as intentional that Amelia was insisting on having this conversation when she knew Kate was already running late. Kate wondered sometimes if Amelia wasn’t more strategic than she gave her credit for. She said yes to a lot of things—late nights out, sleepovers, parties—because Amelia asked when Kate was stressed or in a rush. But a semester in Europe was a different story. Kate wasn’t going to cave to that simply because it would be easier. But it would have been. Much, much easier.

“What does it even matter?” Amelia made an annoyed, guttural noise. “You’re never here anyway.”

Kate’s long work hours weren’t something Amelia usually complained about. Kate had always assumed—hoped maybe was a better word—that it was because having a single mother with a demanding career was the only life her daughter had ever known. But Kate was always bracing herself to discover that her daughter still felt the holes, despite her frantic efforts to cram them full of love.

“Amelia, come on, that’s not fair. And a semester abroad is for college, not high school.”

“It’ll be educational.”

Kate looked over at her daughter, hoping she’d see some hint of humor around her eyes. There was none. She was completely serious.

“Amelia, I wish I could just blow off my meeting and stay to talk this out,” Kate had said, and she’d meant it. “But I honestly can’t. Can we please talk more about it tonight, when I get home?”

“Just say yes, Mom!” Amelia had yelled then, startling Kate. Her daughter wasn’t a yeller, certainly not at Kate. “It’s really easy, listen: yes. Just like that.”

This is it, Kate had thought. She’s officially a teenager. It’ll be her against me from now on, not us against the world.

 The worst part about their argument was that Kate had then ended up getting home the night before too late—late again, late always—to talk about the semester abroad. But she’d been ready when she’d gotten up the next morning—that morning. She’d even woken up early— despite the fact that the meeting with Victor was bound to be one of the most stressful of her career—so she’d have plenty of time to talk to Amelia about Paris. She’d planned to stay firm on her no, but had decided to offer up a trip there together at Christmas. Kate had planned to apologize for not being home more, too, especially lately. She’d still been managing to keep her and Amelia’s Friday dinner dates and their Sunday movie nights. But their weekend adventures had been in much shorter supply.

Ever since Amelia was little, Kate had always tried to be sure they took at least one field trip together every weekend—a Broadway show, an exhibit at the Met, the cherry blossom festival at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, or the Mermaid Parade in Coney Island. But it had been harder with the metastasizing Associated Mutual Bank case, not to mention Amelia’s own commitments—field hockey and French club and volunteering and friends. These days, it seemed she was always headed off somewhere, too.

Kate was still standing up near the subway doors, studying her tired reflection in the long window, when the subway’s automated conductor came over the PA system.

“We are being held momentarily because of train traffic ahead,” the computerized voice said. “Please be patient.”

In the end, Kate hadn’t had any conversation with Amelia that morning about her job or Paris or anything else. After all that preparation and worry, Amelia had simply sauntered down the stairs all sunshine and light, saying she didn’t want to go to Paris after all. Now, of course, that sudden change of heart seemed suspect. Kate still didn’t believe that Amelia would have ever done something bad enough to warrant a suspension. But with the erratic way she’d been acting the past couple of days, maybe she could have done something a tiny bit bad.

Kate checked her watch again. One hour and ten minutes late. Shit. She was a terrible, terrible mother. It was too much, juggling her job and parenting by herself. She had no margin for error. There were other law jobs that would have allowed her more flexibility—less money, too, though she and Amelia could have made do with much less. Money wasn’t the real reason Kate stayed at her job anyway. She liked her job, and she was good at it, and that made her feel capable and secure. Success—first academic, later professional—had always made her feel that way: safe. And that was no small matter given that there was no knight in shining armor on the horizon.

Not that Kate was in the market for a rescue. She wasn’t in the market, period. She’d gone on a few dates over the years, mostly because she’d felt like she should. Friends had often insisted on setting her up, too. But Kate had never had good luck with relationships, not in high school, not in college, and not in law school. In fact, her healthiest relationship had been with Seth, whose biggest takeaway from Kate was that he was actually gay. Before Seth, Kate had had other boyfriends, usually the emotionally distant type. At least she was old enough now to recognize that her poor taste in partners had everything to do with her upbringing, though that did not mean it was something she could change.

These days, it was hard to say whether the men she went out with were wrong or if between Amelia and her job Kate couldn’t make space for them. Regardless, nothing—no one—had ever stuck. And life had almost seemed easier that way. Except that now, at thirty-eight, Kate’s accidental baby—her mother’s charming term, one that she used glibly even when Amelia was old enough to understand— might be her only baby. The notion of Kate being the mother of an only child didn’t exactly feel wrong, but it was recklessly economical.

By the time the train was finally pulling into Grand Army Plaza, Kate was one hour and fifteen minutes late. She sprang off when the train doors finally hissed open, her heart picking up speed as she jogged for the station steps.

Up on the sidewalk, she blinked back the brightness. Shielding her eyes with a hand, she walked briskly, turning onto Prospect Park West. The two-lane, one-way street was quiet at that hour, and Kate’s very high client-meeting heels clicked loudly against the concrete. The park, with its brightly hued, late October maples, was across the street on her left. The leaves had begun to fall, gathering in a thick ridge along the wall lining the park, a park Kate hadn’t been inside in years.

After fifteen years in Park Slope, Kate still felt more at home in her office than on her own Brooklyn block. She had wanted a cozy, neighborly, open-minded place to raise Amelia, and Park Slope was certainly all of those things. But the Food Coop walkers, the piles of recycled goods left out for the taking, and the tight cliques of shabby-chic families gathered on playgrounds adjacent to their multimillion-dollar brownstones still felt like charming details from someone else’s life.

Up ahead, Kate watched two quintessential Park Slope moms, attractive and urban without being overtly hip, chatting as they came out of the park. Each pushed a sleek jogging stroller, a small child gripped in their one free hand, an eco-friendly water bottle in their cup holders. They were laughing as they walked on, unbothered by the little ones tugging at their hands. Watching them, Kate felt as if she’d never had a child of her own.

Kate had always planned on having a family. At least two children, maybe even three. She’d originally hoped to avoid having an only child, given her own less-than-happy solitary girlhood. She had come to realize, though, that having an “only” did not actually require that you treat them from birth like a mini adult. Kate had also assumed that— however many children she did one day have—they would come later. Much, much later. Kate was going to focus on her career first, make some headway as her mother, Gretchen—professor emeritus of neurology at the University of Chicago School of Medicine—had drilled into her. Career first, kids only if there was time.

But her life had taken a different turn. And in the end, she hadn’t wanted to take advantage of any of the “options” Gretchen had pressed on her to “handle” her “unfortunate situation.” Because Kate may have admired her mother’s professional success, but she had no wish to emulate her in any other way. Instead, Kate took her pregnancy as a sign, one that she would ignore at her peril. And also as a chance for something more.

Motherhood, of course, had been hard, especially single motherhood at the age of twenty-four while still attending law school. But she—they—had survived. Kate and Amelia’s true salvation had been Leelah, the nanny who’d cared for Amelia for fifteen straight years. It was Leelah’s warmth and compassion and excellent cooking that had truly kept their heads above water. It was with great regret that Kate had scaled back Leelah’s hours to only cooking and cleaning while Amelia was at school. Amelia had been insisting since last fall that she was too old for a nanny, and Kate had finally lacked the fortitude to fight her anymore. They both missed Leelah, though: Amelia more than she would admit; Kate more than she could sometimes bear.

Kate paused as the two women with their strollers crossed the street in front of her, then followed them as they headed across Garfield. She watched their narrow hips in their yoga pants, their high, matching ponytails swishing right, then left.

“Look at all those fire trucks,” gasped one of the women, stopping so abruptly on the opposite corner that Kate almost crashed into her perfectly sculpted rear end. “Are they at the school?”

“Oh God, I hope not,” the other one said, pushing up onto her toes to get a better look. “They’re not rushing anywhere at least. It must be a false alarm.”

Kate looked toward the fire trucks blocking half of Garfield Street. They were parked in front of a side entrance to Grace Hall’s Upper School, an ornate old mansion that looked like a grand public library. Several police cars were in front of the adjacent Grace Hall Lower School, two brownstones that had been overtaken long ago and refurbished in a similar style. The firemen were loitering around the sidewalk, chatting in groups, leaning against their trucks.

There was also an ambulance sitting there with its lights off, doors closed. If there had been an actual fire or some other emergency, it was over now. Or maybe it had been a false alarm.

Amelia couldn’t have pulled the fire alarm, could she have? No, only juvenile delinquents did things like pull fire alarms. Whatever Amelia’s mood lately, whatever that junior-year-abroad nonsense had been about and however deep her sudden existential crises about her absent dad, Amelia was not, and would never be, a juvenile delinquent.

Kate took a deep breath and exhaled loudly, which caused the taller mother standing in front of her to startle and spin around. She tugged her cherub-faced little girl in the puffy pink vest closer. Kate smiled awkwardly as she stepped around them. She tried to see past the ambulance. There, on the side, was a uniformed officer talking to an older, gray-haired woman in a long brown sweater. She was walking a tiny, shivering dog and was hugging herself, hard.

People weren’t interviewed for fire alarms. Kate looked up at the classroom windows. And where were all the kids? The ones whose faces should have been pressed up against the glass, investigating the commotion? Kate found herself moving closer.

“So you heard the scream first?” the police officer asked the grayhaired woman. “Or the sound?”

Scream. Sound. Kate watched two police officers come out of the school’s front door, head down the steps, then turn into the school’s side yard. When she peered after them, she could finally see that that was where the real action was. At least a dozen police officers were gathered in a large pack. And still, there was no rushing. It no longer seemed like a good sign. In fact, it was beginning to seem like a terrible one.

“Ma’am,” came a loud voice then, right in Kate’s ear. “I’m going to need you to head back over to the other side of the street there. We need to keep this area clear.”

There was a hand on her arm, too, hard and unfriendly. Kate turned to see a huge police officer towering over her. He had a doughy, boyish face.

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” he said again, a tiny bit less forcefully. “But this side of the street is closed to pedestrians.”

“But my daughter’s inside the school.” Kate turned back to look at the building. A bomb threat, an anthrax scare, a school shooting— where were all the children? Kate’s heart was picking up speed. “I need to get my daughter. I’m supposed to. They called me. I’m already late.”

The officer squinted at her for a long time, as though he was willing her to disappear.

“Okay, I guess I can go check it out,” he said finally, looking skeptical. “But you still got to go wait over there.” He pointed to the other side of Garfield. “What’s your daughter’s name?”

“Amelia. Amelia Baron. They called from the headmaster’s office to say she’d been suspended. They said I had to come get her.” Immediately, Kate wished she’d left that part out. The officer might be less inclined to help if he thought Amelia was a troublemaker. Maybe even the troublemaker. “Wait, before you go,” Kate called after him, “can you at least tell me what happened?”

“We’re still trying to figure that out.” His voice drifted as he turned to stare at the building for a minute. Then he turned back to Kate and pointed again. “Now, go there. I’ll be right back.”

Kate didn’t go where he’d pointed. Instead, she stood on her toes to see if she could make out what was in the backyard. She could see there were actually more than a dozen officers back there—some in uniforms, some in dark suits—clustered up near the side of the building, their backs forming a curved wall. It was as if they were hiding something. Something awful.

Someone had been hurt, or worse. Kate felt sure of it now. Had there been a fight? A stray bullet? This was brownstone Brooklyn, but it was still Brooklyn. Things happened.

As soon as the police officer who’d stopped Kate was through the school’s front doors, she darted up to the fence at the side yard. Officers were shielding their eyes as they stared up the side of the building toward the roof. Kate stared up there, too. She could see nothing except the immaculately maintained facade of the old stone building.

When she looked back down, the officers had shifted. And there, in the center of their protective circle, was a boot. Black, flat-heeled, rugged, it lay there on its side like a felled animal. But there was something else there, too, something much larger. Something covered with a sheet.

Kate’s heart was pounding as she wrapped her fingers around the bars of the wrought iron fence and squeezed. She looked at the boot again. It was the kind that lots of girls wore with skinny jeans or leggings. But Amelia’s were brown, weren’t they? Kate should know. She should know the color of her own daughter’s shoes.

“Mrs. Baron?” came a man’s voice then.

Kate whipped around, bracing to be told by the same baby-faced policeman that she wasn’t where he’d told her to be. Instead, behind her was an attractive but tough-looking guy in jeans and a hooded sweatshirt. He was about Kate’s age, with a strong, square face, a tightly shaved head, and the bound-up energy of a boxer, or maybe a criminal about to make a break for it. There was a badge hanging from a cord around his neck.

“You’re Kate Baron?” he asked, taking a step closer.

He had a tough Brooklyn twang that went with the rest of him. But he was trying to seem soft. Kate didn’t like his trying to be gentle with her. It made her nervous. Behind him, Kate could see the uniformed officer she’d talked to before, standing on the steps with a gray-haired woman in red reading glasses. They were staring at her.

“Where is Amelia?” Kate heard herself shout. Or had it been someone else? It sounded like her voice, but she hadn’t felt the words coming out of her mouth. “What’s happened?”

“I’m Detective Molina.” He reached out a hand but stopped short of actually putting it on Kate’s arm. A tattoo on his forearm—a cross— peaked out from under the sleeve of his sweatshirt. “Could you please come with me, ma’am?”

This wasn’t right. She didn’t want to go somewhere with this detective. She wanted to be sent somewhere out of the way. Where all the other irrelevant spectators were sent.

“No.” Kate jerked away. Her heart was racing. “Why?”

“It’s okay, ma’am,” he said, putting a strong hand on her elbow and tugging her toward him. Now his voice was lower, more careful, as if Kate had a horrific head wound she was unaware of. “Why don’t you just come over here with me and have a seat.”

Kate closed her eyes and tried to picture Amelia’s feet that morning when she’d happily bounded out the door. Mothers were supposed to know what kind of shoes their children were wearing. They were supposed to check. Kate felt light-headed.

“I don’t want to have a seat,” she said, her panic rising. “Just tell me what’s wrong. Tell me now!”

“Okay, Mrs. Baron, okay,” Detective Molina said quietly. “There’s been an accident.”

“But Amelia’s okay, right?” Kate demanded, leaning back against the fence. Why weren’t they rushing? Why was the ambulance just sitting there? Where were all the flashing lights? “She has to be okay. I need to see her. I need her. Where is she?”

Kate should run. She felt sure of it. She needed to go somewhere far away where no one could tell her anything. But instead, she was sinking, sliding down to the cold, hard sidewalk. There she sat, balled up against her knees, mouth pressed hard against them as if she were bracing herself for a crash landing.

Run, she told herself, run. But it was too late.

And for one long, last moment, there was only the sound of her heart beating. The pressure of her tight, shallow pants.

“Your daughter, Amelia”—the detective was crouched next to her now—“she fell from the roof, Mrs. Baron. She was . . . she unfortunately didn’t survive the fall. I’m sorry, Mrs. Baron. But your daughter, Amelia, is dead.”

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