“Some do.”
“My friends don’t.”
“That’s good.”
“Maybe grown-ups should remember how to be kids.”
I laughed.
“Maybe.”
He closed his eyes.
By ten o’clock, the house was quiet.
By midnight, the photograph of Caleb and Sophie had already been shared hundreds of times online.
I didn’t know that.
I also didn’t know that someone sitting alone in a dark kitchen twelve miles away had seen it…
and started crying.
By dawn, our front yard was covered in lunchboxes.
PART 5 — “MA’AM, DON’T TOUCH THE MONEY”
The police arrived at 6:46 a.m.
Two patrol cars pulled up.
Our neighbors started opening curtains.
Officer Daniel Reeves walked across our lawn, looked around at the fifty-something lunchboxes, and said exactly what I was thinking.
“Well. This is new.”
I explained everything.
The dress.
The lunch money.
The party.
The mysterious boxes.
Then I showed him the metal one.
