Chapter 10 - The County Courthouse Hallway
The courthouse smelled like old coffee and floor wax. I sat on a hard wooden bench outside Department Four with my bunny in my lap and my legs not quite reaching the floor. Daniel’s hand was on the back of the bench behind me, not touching me, just there. Mom sat on my other side with her purse clutched so tight her knuckles were white. She kept checking her phone and then putting it away again without answering it.
Daniel had told me that morning we weren’t going inside the big courtroom. “You don’t have to talk today,” he’d said while I ate toast at his kitchen island. “This part is just paperwork. For the grown-ups.” He said it twice, like he wanted me to actually believe it.
A woman in a navy blazer came out into the hallway and called Daniel and Mom by name. Her badge said Assistant District Attorney - Reyes. She crouched a little when she spoke to me, even though she wasn’t really talking to me.
“Sophia, thanks for waiting,” she said. Her voice was low and even. “Daniel, we filed this morning.”
Daniel nodded. He’d been holding a manila folder all morning and his watch kept catching the fluorescent light.
Ms. Reyes looked at Mom then. “A criminal charge for child abuse was filed against your husband. The judge signed a no-contact order. He can’t come near Sophia or your home, and he can’t contact either of you directly. A sheriff served him an hour ago at his attorney’s office.”
Mom didn’t say anything at first. She breathed out through her nose. “He texted my sister,” she whispered.
“That’s a violation if it was through a third party to reach you,” Reyes said. “Save it. Give it to me.” She turned a page on her clipboard. “Family court also opened a dependency case. That’s separate from the criminal case. That’s to decide where Sophia lives while this is pending and to make sure she’s safe.”
I stared at the pattern in the marble floor and held my bunny tighter. I didn’t understand half the words but I understood that Daddy wasn’t allowed to come home.
Later, down the hall in a smaller office with no windows, a lady from CPS named Jen sat with us at a table. She had the kind of smile that didn’t try too hard. She slid a paper across to Daniel.
Daniel read it out loud, mostly for me. “Petition for temporary kinship guardianship,” he said, his finger under each line. “It says I’m asking the court to let you stay with me until the family court hearing. Jen’s office supports it.”
Jen nodded at Mom. “Lauren, the county is recommending placement with your brother. It’s the least disruptive. Sophia stays in her school, keeps her therapist, no foster care.”
Mom looked at the paper, then at me. Her eyes were red like she hadn’t slept. “Is that what you want?” she asked me, so quiet I almost didn’t hear.
I didn’t know I was supposed to answer. I looked at Daniel. He didn’t prompt me.
“I like sleeping there,” I said. “I don’t have bad dreams there.”
Mom’s mouth pressed together and she nodded once, sharp. “Okay,” she said to Jen. “Okay, I’ll sign it.”
She signed with a pen that skipped. Daniel signed after her. Jen stamped something and said the family court judge would review it that afternoon and set a hearing for next week.
We were waiting again on that bench when Daddy’s lawyer found Mom. He was a man in a gray suit who didn’t look at me or Daniel at all.
“Lauren,” he said, “can I have a minute? Privately?”
Mom stood. Daniel stood too. “Whatever you have to say, you can say with us,” Daniel said. His voice stayed calm but his hand came to rest lightly on my shoulder.
The lawyer sighed. “My client is willing to accept a plea. Misdemeanor, counseling, parenting classes. No jail. He takes responsibility, we all avoid a trial. No one puts Sophia on a stand. Your family wants this, Lauren. Your mother called me this morning.”
Mom flinched. “My mom called you?”
“She’s worried about you having to testify against your husband in open court,” he said. “About Sophia. This lets everyone move on. The no-contact can be modified to supervised contact after he completes treatment.”
Ms. Reyes had stepped back out and heard the last part. She didn’t raise her voice.
“That offer leaves him with access,” she said flatly. “The state won’t accept it. The medical and forensic interview support a felony. And supervised contact is not on the table right now.”
The lawyer looked annoyed. “You’re going to traumatize that child for a trial you might not win without the mother’s full testimony.”
Mom’s hands were shaking. She looked down at me on the bench, at my bunny, at my right knee where the bruises had faded to yellow. I could see her deciding. For a second she looked like she might say yes just to make the hallway stop buzzing.
“No,” she said. Her voice cracked. “I already gave a written statement. I’m not taking it back. I don’t want him near her.”
The lawyer pressed his lips together and walked away without another word. Mom sat back down hard and put her face in her hands for a second, then wiped her eyes and tried to smile at me.
Daniel knelt then, just like in our kitchen that December night, so his eyes were level with mine. “You heard all that?” he whispered.
I nodded.
May you like
“Nothing changes today except it’s official on paper,” he said. “You stay with me. Mom stays in the apartment. Daddy stays away. Next week we go back for the family court hearing. You still don’t have to talk until your therapist says you’re ready.”
The clerk called our case number from the doorway and Ms. Reyes went in with Jen. Mom and Daniel and I stayed on the bench. The hallway was suddenly quiet except for the hum of the lights. I leaned a little into Daniel’s side and he let me. Mom reached over and, after a pause, rested her hand very lightly on the edge of my bunny’s ear. She didn’t pull him away. She just let her hand sit there.
