Chapter 26 - Fifty-one cents
Three years after the lobby incident, Maeve was eight.
Theo was twelve.
His doctors still monitored him.
Rebecca returned to work full-time.
They lived in Peoria.
They did not move into a Romano house.
They did not receive a secret trust.
They did not become my family because a child had been kind to me.
The Sofia Foundation covered only benefits they were actually eligible to receive.
Everything else remained theirs.
Maeve still remembered the coins.
Of course.
At a small hospital fundraiser, she saw me.
No wheelchair.
Slight limp when tired.
She ran over.
“Rocco!”
Rebecca called:
“Walk!”
Maeve slowed dramatically.
Eight-year-olds weaponize compliance.
She looked at my hands.
“Where money?”
“What money?”
“My money.”
“Your fifty-one cents?”
“Yes.”
“I donated it.”
Her jaw dropped.
“To Sofia program.”
“That was mine.”
“You gave it to me.”
“For you.”
“I was not actually poor.”
“You looked poor.”
Rebecca covered her face.
I laughed.
Maeve crossed her arms.
“You owe me.”
“How much?”
“Fifty-one cents.”
“Interest?”
She thought.
“Yes.”
Terrifying.
I gave her a dollar.
She handed me forty-nine cents back.
I looked at the coins.
“What’s this?”
“I’m not a thief.”
Then she put the dollar in the hospital donation jar.
All of it.
Rebecca sighed.
“Maeve.”
“What?”
“You could buy something.”
Maeve shrugged.
“The kids need it.”
I looked away.
May you like
Some lessons should not be turned into speeches.
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