Chapter 2
But she kept going.
“You’re not dragging her to a hospital over spilled juice.”
I felt something inside me go cold.
Spilled juice.
The only two people who had mentioned juice were Daisy and the person covering for the man who hurt her.
I didn’t shout.
I think that surprised my wife more than anything.
I just said, “Get her shoes.”
“Kevin, don’t start.”
“Get her shoes.”
Daisy grabbed my sleeve with both hands.
When I lifted her, as carefully as I could, she gasped and folded into me, trying not to cry.
That sound did more to me than any scream could have.
My wife stepped in front of the door.
“You’re making this worse,” she hissed.
“No,” I said.
“Whoever touched her already did that.”
I carried Daisy to the car.
The ride to the children’s ER was only twelve minutes, but every red light felt personal.
Daisy sat sideways because it hurt too much to lean back.
I loosened her seat belt every time we stopped so it wouldn’t press against her.
My wife called five times in a row.
I muted the phone after the third call, but I didn’t delete anything.
Something in me had already shifted from panic to record-keeping.
At one stoplight, Daisy said very quietly, “Please don’t let him come here.”
My grip tightened on the steering wheel.
“He won’t.”
“Mom said he was just a friend,” she whispered.
“She said not to tell you when he came over if you were away.”
That wasn’t the first warning I had missed.
Over the last few months there had been things I explained away because life was busy and I was tired and I wanted my marriage to be normal.
A second coffee cup in the sink when I got home early.
My wife suddenly carrying her phone face-down from room to room.
Daisy once mentioning that “Mom’s friend from work” had eaten dinner with them while I was in Chicago.
I had asked one question, gotten a quick answer, and let it go.
Sitting at that red light with my daughter bent in pain beside me, I hated every inch of that denial.
The ER nurse took one look at Daisy’s face and got us into a room fast.
When she lifted the back of Daisy’s pajama top, the smile left her face so quickly it was like a switch had been hit.
The bruise wasn’t small.
It spread dark and ugly across the right side of Daisy’s back, and in the middle of it was a deeper crescent-shaped mark that looked exactly like a cabinet handle.
The nurse didn’t say much after that.
She just said, “I’m going to get the doctor now,” in a voice that had gone very flat.
I stayed beside Daisy while they examined her.
I answered questions.
I signed forms.
I took one photo of the bruise when the nurse said it was all right to document it.
My hands were steady by then.
That frightened me too, because it meant my fear had already hardened into something colder.
My wife arrived before the scan results did.
May you like
She swept into the room looking offended more than worried, like we had inconvenienced her by involving other people.
She kissed the top of Daisy’s head without really touching her and then looked at me.
