Chapter 6: The Hard Conversation
We told Leo after breakfast.
He was sitting at the kitchen table with Gerald propped against the orange juice carton, eating toast with the focused seriousness he brought to everything.
Daniel sat across from him.
I sat beside him.
"Leo," Daniel said, "we need to talk to you about something.
About what you told Claire last night."
Leo set down his toast.
He looked at Daniel, then at me.
"You called someone," he said.
"Yes.
Your caseworker, Renata.
She came this morning while you were sleeping."
His jaw tightened.
"Is she taking me back?"
"No." I said it before he could build the wall any higher.
"She is not taking you back.
That is not what's happening."
"Then what's happening?"
"She took the g*n," Daniel said.
"She had to.
That part wasn't something we could keep here.
But Leo — she took it as evidence.
Against Mr.
Patton.
Not against you."
Leo was very still.
"She's going to use it to investigate him," I continued.
"What you told me last night — about the drawer, about what you saw — that matters.
It could protect other kids who end up in that house."
"He's still doing placements?" Leo's voice was sharp.
"We don't know yet.
But Renata is going to find out."
He looked down at Gerald.
His thumb moved back and forth across the bear's ear, the same gesture as the night before.
"I thought you'd be angry," he said quietly.
"For not telling you when I got here."
"We're not angry," Daniel said.
"You should be.
I brought something dangerous into your house."
"You brought something you thought you needed," I said.
"There's a difference."
Leo looked up.
"Most people don't see it that way."
"We're not most people." Daniel leaned forward slightly.
"And you're not most kids, Leo.
You've been through things that most adults never face.
What you did — keeping track of where it was, thinking about how to stop something bad from happening — that tells me you're someone who protects people.
We just want you to know that here, that's our job.
Protecting you.
You don't have to do it alone anymore."
The kitchen was very quiet.
Leo picked up his toast.
He took a bite.
He chewed slowly.
"Renata wants me to see a therapist," he said.
"Yes.
Someone named Dr.
Okafor.
We've already looked her up.
She seems really good."
"I've had therapists before."
"I know."
"They mostly just asked me how things made me feel."
"Dr.
Okafor works differently," I said.
"But if you try her and you don't like her, we find someone else.
You get a say in that."
Leo considered this.
"Okay."
He finished his toast.
He drained his orange juice.
He picked up Gerald and held him loosely in one hand.
"Can I go set up my books?" he asked.
"I saw there were shelves in my room."
"They're yours," Daniel said.
"Put anything you want on them."
Leo slid off the chair.
At the kitchen door he stopped, the same spot he'd paused the night before.
"Daniel," he said.
"Yeah, buddy."
"The blue room." He looked at the floor for a moment, then back up.
"It's a really good color."
He disappeared down the hallway.
A moment later we heard his feet on the stairs, light and unhurried.
Daniel looked at me.
His eyes were bright.
He pressed his lips together and looked at the ceiling for a second, the way he did when he was trying to hold something in.
"He said my name," he said quietly.
"I heard."
"That's the first time."
"I know."
May you like
He reached over and picked up Leo's empty juice glass and held it for a moment before setting it in the sink.
Outside the kitchen window, the morning was clear and ordinary and full of light.
