“Noah is fine, by the way. Ate all his dinner. Drew you a picture. I put it on the counter.”
“Thank you.”
“He went to bed around ten.”
Gabby’s phone buzzes again and she immediately glances down at it.
Gabby is eighteen, a freshman at the community college down the street, and permanently attached to her phone. She is also the only babysitter I can afford who doesn’t have any questionable connections to the wrong kind of people.
That matters more than anything else.
In this neighborhood, you learn to be careful about who you let into your life.
Besides, professional sitters charge twenty-five dollars an hour. Gabby charges fifteen. Which means I smile and thank hereven when she sends voice notes to her friends while watching my child.
“You’re good from here?” she asks in an inquisitive tone.
“I’ve got it.”
“Cool.” She grabs her bag and heads for the door.
“See you next week.”
“Good night, Gabby.”
The door closes behind her, and the apartment becomes quiet.
For a moment, I just stand there in the kitchen, letting the silence settle around me.
Then I see the drawing. It’s lying on the counter exactly where Gabby said it would be. I take a few steps forward and I pick it up.
Noah has drawn three stick figures standing side by side.
The first one has long hair and a big smile. Above it, he has carefully written the word MOM in uneven block letters.
The second one is smaller. That one is labeled NOAH.
The third figure is taller than both of us. A simple stick figure.
Above, it he has written DAD.
My chest tightens instantly.
The drawing is sweet. So painfully sweet it almost hurts to look at.
Noah doesn’t know his father. He never has. And I have spent six years carefully avoiding every question that might lead him down that road.
Some truths are better left alone.
Still…
My eyes linger on the tall stick figure. Noah has drawn it with dark hair.
I swallow hard.
He looks so much like his father already.
Just then I hear a small voice behind me.
