Chapter 6: His Name
I didn't say yes to Carol Reyes right away.
I told her I needed to think about it and took her number and hung up, and Dan and I sat with Nora between us while the notifications kept coming.
By nine o'clock that night, the video had been shared over 22,000 times.
I hadn't expected that.
I don't think Maria had either.
She called at half past eight, her voice carrying something between excitement and worry.
"Are you seeing these numbers?"
"Yes."
"How are you feeling?"
"Strange," I said honestly.
"Like something left my hands and I can't get it back."
"Do you want it back?"
I thought about the woman in the parking lot with the bananas and the paperback.
*Just remember it.*
"No," I said.
"I think I needed it to leave."
Maria was quiet for a moment.
"Someone found him," she said.
I sat up straighter.
"What do you mean, found him?"
"In the comments.
Someone recognized him.
They posted his name." She paused.
"His full name.
And where he works."
The room felt different suddenly.
"Maria—"
"I know.
I didn't do it.
I wouldn't.
But it's there, and it's spreading, and I can't control that part."
I looked at Dan.
He'd heard enough from my expression to put Nora down in the bassinet and come sit closer.
"What's his name?" I asked.
"Do you want to know?"
I thought about it for longer than I expected to.
"Yes," I said.
"Gerald Patton.
He's a regional manager for a hardware chain.
Three locations." She paused again.
"He has a LinkedIn.
People are already on it."
I said nothing.
"There's something else," Maria said.
Her voice changed — careful now, deliberate.
"Someone posted a screenshot in the comments.
An old post of his.
From about two years ago." She took a breath.
"It's him, on a different platform, complaining about a woman breastfeeding at a restaurant.
He used the word *disgusting* twice."
"So this isn't the first time."
"No," Maria said.
"It doesn't look like it."
I looked at the bassinet.
Nora's chest rising and falling, small and steady and completely unaware.
"He's going to see his name in those comments," I said.
"He probably already has."
"And then what?"
"I don't know," Maria said.
"That's what I'm worried about."
We stayed on the phone for another few minutes without saying much.
After I hung up, Dan and I talked in low voices while Nora slept.
At eleven-fifteen, a new message came through.
Different unknown number.
Different tone entirely.
*I know what you're trying to do.
May you like
It won't work.
I have a lawyer.*
