Chapter 6
The sheriff held the door to his cruiser open and nodded toward the passenger seat. The clinic parking lot was still bright, heat coming off the asphalt in waves. My son sat on the bench by the entrance with the victim's advocate, a woman named Carla who'd given him a juice box he hadn't opened. His legs dangled, bruises dark against his knees. The sheriff didn't touch my phone. He just said, "Put him on speaker, Diane. Same questions you asked me inside."
My name is Diane and that afternoon I still had the clinic paperwork folded in my purse.
My hands shook when I found Elias under ICE. He picked up on the third ring.
"Hey, Di," he said. His voice was easy, a little out of breath. Like he'd been outside.
I swallowed. "Hey. You're on speaker with Sheriff Keller here at the clinic. He wanted to talk about last night."
A pause. "Sheriff? What's this about?"
The sheriff leaned in, not taking the phone from me. "Mr. Elias, thanks for picking up. We're following up on your nephew. Diane brought him in just now. We're documenting some bruising — left cheek, both arms, knees. Can you walk us through how he got hurt on your watch?"
Elias laughed, short. "Oh, that. Yeah, playground. He took a spill off the monkey bars yesterday evening. You know how kids are. He caught himself wrong. Roughhousing after dinner too, wrestling with me in the living room. Nothing major."
I stared at the phone in my palm. My cut stung under the gauze they'd put on my chin. "What time was the playground?" I asked.
"Late afternoon. Maybe five? Sun was still up."
The sheriff glanced at me, then said evenly, "And roughhousing — what time was that?"
"After dinner. Seven, seven-thirty. He landed on his arm."
I felt my stomach drop. "But you said monkey bars at five. That's the arm bruise, or the evening?"
"Both, I mean—" Elias caught himself. "He fell at five, then we were playing later and he bumped it again. Same arm."
The sheriff didn't interrupt. He let the silence sit for a breath. Then, "Who was supervising at the playground?"
"You know, I was right there," Elias said quickly. "On the bench. Turned for a second to grab his water bottle."
"Any other adults see it?" the sheriff asked. "Any incident report from the park or ER visit last night?"
"No need for ER. I cleaned him up. He was fine, just whiny. Put some ice on it."
My voice came out thinner than I wanted. "Elias, you had him overnight. Did he cry? Did he say it hurt later?"
"He fussed a little, Di. I told you he's dramatic. You know he bruises easy."
The sheriff looked at my son on the bench, then back at the phone. "Mr. Elias, timeline matters here. You had him from yesterday at four p.m. until Diane picked him up this morning at eight. That's about sixteen hours unsupervised by his mother. No call to her, no note sent with him, no photo, no clinic visit that night. Can you explain why not?"
Another pause, longer this time. I could hear a TV in the background at his place.
"I didn't think it was serious," Elias said. "I didn't want to worry her over a scrape. He's my responsibility when he's with me."
He said it exactly like the man at the gas pump had. He's my responsibility.
My hand tightened around the phone. Carla shifted on the bench to angle herself between my son and the parking lot.
"Did he sleep through the night?" I asked. My throat was dry. "Did he eat breakfast?"
"Yeah, cereal. He was fine this morning," Elias said. Then, a beat too late, "Slept great."
The sheriff nodded once, more to himself than to us. "Alright, Mr. Elias. Here's what needs to happen. We're opening a report with CPS based on the medical documentation from today. I'd like to do a home visit tomorrow morning to see where he was playing, take a few photos, make sure the space is safe. Can you be available at nine a.m. at your residence?"
"Nine?" Elias said. "Uh, yeah, sure. I got work but I can call off."
"Please stay available and don't clean or move anything in the play area," the sheriff said. "We'll keep this straightforward. And keep your phone on. If I have follow-up questions tonight, I'll call."
"Okay. Okay, sheriff."
I ended the call. My finger hovered over the red button before I pressed it. The heat pressed down on the cruiser and the clinic doors and the bench where my son sat still not drinking his juice. The bruise on my right forearm throbbed under my sleeve.
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The sheriff wrote in his notebook — Elias: playground 5pm, roughhousing 730pm, no report, no call, timeline gap 4pm-8am — and then tore off the bottom sheet and handed it to me. Home visit scheduled, he said. Keep the medical forms together. Don't text Elias anything else tonight.
I looked at my son and realized I'd known, halfway through that second story, that my brother was lying.
