Chapter 6
Uncle Darius called me the next morning.
I almost answered because his name had always meant jokes, loud music, and birthday presents.
Then I remembered him telling me patience was the lesson.
I carried the phone to Dad.
Dad looked at the screen.
“Do you want to speak to him?”
“No.”
“You don’t have to.”
He let the call go unanswered.
A message arrived.
Tell your dad we need to stop letting strangers ruin this family.
I read it twice.
“Are the lawyer and bank strangers?”
“They are people doing their jobs.”
“Is he saying I’m ruining it?”
Dad crouched in front of me.
“No. Darius is trying to put pressure on us. I’ll handle the message.”
He saved it and sent it to Ms. Carter.
Maya went back to school on Sunday.
Before she left, she handed me a small notebook.
“What’s this?”
“For stuff you don’t feel like saying out loud.”
“Are you checking it?”
“Only if you ask.”
I put it beside Grandpa’s globe.
On Monday, I met Ms. Lewis, our school counselor.
She had a box of small wooden blocks and asked whether I liked building.
I told her I preferred drawing.
She gave me paper.
I drew our kitchen.
Mom stood beside the island. Dad was on a phone screen. I drew myself between them.
Ms. Lewis asked what I noticed.
“I’m small.”
“Does that feel important?”
“I can’t make either one stop being upset.”
She nodded.
“You are not responsible for doing that.”
Everybody kept saying it.
I wished my stomach would believe them.
She asked whether I worried about food, our house, or school.
“College,” I said.
“You’re thinking far ahead.”
“Grandpa was.”
I told her about the globe.
She listened.
Afterward, I asked Dad whether I could keep seeing her.
“Yes.”
He sounded relieved.
During the next two weeks, Mom called at agreed times. Sometimes we talked about school. Sometimes I asked questions about the money.
She began answering without blaming Dad.
That did not make everything normal.
It made the calls easier.
Dad met with investigators. They asked for messages, signatures, transfer records, and Darius’s business documents.
I learned parts of it from Dad in small conversations.
There was no special investment account making money for families.
Darius had used funds to cover old debts and personal expenses. He had also accepted money from other relatives after promising returns he could not explain.
Mom had sent him our payments first.
Then, when he couldn’t return them, she used the college money.
“She tried to fix one missing amount with a bigger amount,” Dad told me.
“Like taking money from another jar?”
“Yes.”
“But she didn’t put it back.”
“No.”
I looked at my savings jar.
I had moved it from my shelf to the bottom drawer.
I didn’t like what that said about how I felt.
One afternoon, Mom came for a walk with me. Dad agreed, and Aunt Paula joined us. We went to the park near our house.
Mom asked about my science project.
I told her.
Then I asked why she believed Darius after Dad said no.
She stopped walking.
“Because he’s my brother. Because I wanted to help him. And because he said I could be the person who finally made things better.”
“Did you want him to like you?”
Her eyes filled.
“I wanted him to respect me.”
“Did he?”
She looked toward the playground.
“I don’t think he respected what I was risking.”
“But you risked our things.”
“Yes.”
Aunt Paula stayed a few steps away.
Mom did not ask me to forgive her.
I appreciated that.
When we got home, Dad was waiting on the porch.
Mom handed him copies of messages she had finally recovered from her phone.
“I’m giving everything to the investigators,” she said.
Dad nodded.
“Good.”
That night, he told Maya on the phone that Mom’s records helped show how Darius had pressured her and what she knowingly did afterward.
Both could be true.
I was beginning to learn adults could be hurt by someone and still hurt other people.
A few days later, Darius came to our house.
Dad spoke to him through the porch camera and told him to leave.
Darius stayed.
He shouted that Dad had turned his sister against him.
I stood in the hallway, frozen.
Dad called the police.
Before they arrived, Darius drove away.
I looked at Dad.
“Do you still call him family?”
Dad took a breath.
“He is related to us. That doesn’t give him permission to frighten us.”
May you like
I nodded.
It was another rule I wished I had known sooner.
