“You did?”
She nodded.
“Then why didn’t you?” Sinking back to the chair, Leah’s glistening lips hung open.
“Diane Smith recommended removal. She’s a darn good probation officer. She’s been to the boy’s home. I haven’t.”
And the boy’s mother…
“You knew that before you went in.”
Carla Billings, in spite of her many shortcomings, had been so in tune with her son she’d seemed to have felt every breath he took. A person had to be pretty insensitive to rent apart a bond that close.
Valerie didn’t think she’d survive if Blake and Brian were ever taken away from her…
“I did know it, you’re right,” Valerie answered belatedly when Leah continued to silently appraise her.
“C.P.S. moved for removal.”
And Diane had spent more time with the boy.
“Abraham put up a good fight for himself. He was willing to do whatever he had to do to stay home.”
“So what does he have to do?”
“He’s on probation with community service.” It was the strongest penalty she could give for truancy.
“I want to keep as close an eye on that boy as possible,” she said. “And I want him busy, out of his home participating in a good cause, for as many of his waking hours as we can manage.”
She wanted him away from the mother she’d just allowed to retain custody. Though nothing had been proven yet, no official filing, Abraham’s mother was most likely prostituting out of her home—although there’d been a vague claim that she was some sort of bookkeeper.
That was all speculation at this point, however. Right now, her biggest concern was Carla’s incorrigible twelve-year-old son. A young man who’d attended only nineteen of the first forty days of his seventh-grade year. The middle of October, and already the kid was in jeopardy of having to repeat the grade.
A grade he’d barely reached due to absenteeism in his last year of elementary school.
His probation required thirty-two hours of commitment weekly. And just as important, constant communication with a probation officer. It was a harsh disposition. And Abraham had signed the requisite contract without hesitation. Most of his thirty-two hours had to be fulfilled by attending his classes at Menlo Ranch Junior High.
“They tried CUTS, right?” Leah asked, frowning, referring to the Court Unified Truancy Suppression program.
Judicial assistants reviewed all files. Valerie’s J.A. remembered everything she read. “A requisite component of the program is parental participation.” The implication was clear.
Valerie also remembered everything in the files she read. Including the name of Abraham’s school. Menlo Ranch. Which her own sons attended.
“You want me to send your robe out for dry cleaning?” Leah got to her feet.
Valerie shook her head. As her assistant left, closing the door behind her, she slouched back in her chair, hands linked across her stomach, and stared at the ceiling. Her job was to make decisions. She’d made one.
So why was she doubting that she’d done her job?
In her mind’s eye, she suddenly pictured a man. The new crossing guard at the boy’s school. He’d only been around since the start of the semester, replacing old Mr. Grimble who’d been working the corner in front of the elementary/junior-high complex since Blake and Brian had started kindergarten. The new guy wasn’t old—mid-thirties, Valerie guessed. Younger than her own thirty-seven years.
He was about medium height for a man. Five-eleven maybe. And although he wasn’t skinny, he was slim. Clean-shaven. With brown hair cut in a businesslike style above his ears. But what Valerie remembered most about him was the way his mouth quirked to the right when he smiled.
And he’d been smiling at her—and everyone else approaching his crosswalk—since the first day of school eight weeks before. Every morning when she dropped the boys at his corner. He waved, too. And she’d heard him call her boys by name—their right names. An unusual feat for someone who wasn’t intimately acquainted with them. Blake and Brian were identical twins.
Standing, Valerie grabbed her clothes out of the canvas bag she carried back and forth to work, locked her office door and quickly changed. She’d never spoken to the crosswalk man. Didn’t even know his name. But thinking about him calmed her, anyway.
She put on her in-line skates at the trunk of her car, skated a full twelve miles in less than an hour, showered, and still had time for a bowl of soup with crackers.
By the time she was seated for her Wednesday-afternoon calendar, she felt whole again. Confident. Ready to determine new directions for the lives of her troubled kids.
“HI, CINDY, got your lunch money today?” Kirk smiled at the pint-size redhead standing at the corner with him on the fourth Thursday in October.
“Yep, see?” she said, holding it up for him.
He glanced quickly at the couple of dollars she held, returning his attention immediately to the goings-on around him. There would be no children in his street unless he said so. “Good,” he told the fourth-grader. “Now, be sure you put it someplace you can find it at lunchtime.”
“I will.” The girl giggled, and skipped across the street as he stepped out, raising his sign to stop traffic.
Several other kids had gathered, as well. Kirk greeted each of them by name as they passed. Steve and Kaitlin and little Jimmy Granger. Jake and Josh and Melissa and…
The day, the job, continued. When school had started in August, he’d given himself a week to learn the names of the kids. Since then, he’d paid close attention to the children themselves.
As soon as he stepped back to the curb, a car pulled up on the west corner. Abraham Billings. That made six days in a row.
Kirk was impressed.
Until the past week and a half, Abraham had missed school more often than he’d come. But when he did show, his mother always dropped him off. She kissed him on the cheek, then sat in her car watching until he’d disappeared inside the school.
Kirk could imagine Susan there, doing the same with Alicia.
“Hey, buddy,” Kirk said as the boy approached his corner.
“Hi.” The word was barely uttered.
At the moment Abraham was the only one waiting there to cross. Which meant that Kirk could hold him there for a second, have a chance to talk with him.
“You okay?” Kirk had known for months that this agile young man had problems.
“Yeah.”
He waved to the boy’s mom, who waved back. Abraham scowled.
“You mad at her?” Kirk asked.
“No.” The tone was almost belligerent.
Abraham was probably one of the best-looking kids in his class. Tanned and lithe, he had perfectly proportioned features and big brown eyes. He wasn’t looking particularly attractive at the moment, however.
Deciding to leave well enough alone for that day, Kirk adjusted the edge of his bright orange vest and waited for enough kids to warrant stopping traffic. He didn’t see any children coming down the street. He’d wait another thirty seconds and then halt traffic anyway.
“Do you hafta wave at her like that?” The question seemed to burst from Abraham.
“Like what?”
“Like