I like it the way it is, she said. I wanted to say that. Nobody said anything for a moment. Then Victoria said quietly and without looking at either of them. I like it the way it is, too. Ethan kept his eyes on the road. He felt the sentence arrive and settle somewhere in him and did not trust himself to respond without saying the thing he’d been building toward for weeks without knowing it.

And this was not the moment for it. With a courthouse 10 minutes away and a hearing to get through and a daughter in the middle seat with Humphrey in her pocket. We’ll talk about it, he said, after today. Sophie nodded, satisfied to have said the thing and had it heard and went back to watching the road.

Judge Alderman was the same woman, same reading glasses, same measured attention, and she ran the hearing with the efficiency of someone who had all the necessary information and was now confirming it against what was in front of her. Gerald Park presented the documentation. Karen Reeves spoke to the placement quality. Dana Flores, the guardian ad lightum, submitted her report and spoke briefly to Sophie’s progress, her school performance, her counseling with Dr.

hail the improvement in her engagement in affect since October. Then Judge Alderman asked to speak to Sophie directly. This part had been explained to Sophie. She sat in the chair beside Gerald Park with her hands folded and her back straight and Humphrey invisible in the pocket of her green dress because Victoria had gently suggested that perhaps Humphrey could wait outside the chair for this part.

And Sophie had considered this and agreed without argument. Sophie, Judge Alderman said in a tone that was slightly warmer than her courtroom default. I want to ask you a few questions. You can answer however you want in whatever words feel right to you. Okay. Okay. Sophie said, “Can you tell me how things have been at the farm? What it’s been like living there?” Sophie thought about it with her characteristic deliberateness.

It’s different from before, she said. Before I lived in an apartment and it was just me and my mom. Now it’s a farm and there are more people and it’s louder sometimes. She paused. But it’s better. I have my own desk and the light in my room in the morning is good for drawing and there’s an orchard. She glanced at Ethan without quite meaning to. I’ve been learning about the trees.

Do you feel safe? Judge Alderman said. Yes, Sophie said without hesitation. Do you feel like the people you’re living with care about you? Sophie considered this with the full weight of her attention. Yes, she said then, because she was Sophie and incomplete answers were not in her nature.

Ethan, my dad, he’s trying hard. I can tell. He’s not perfect at it, but he’s trying, and that’s actually what matters, I think. She glanced at Judge Alderman. Dr. Dr. Hail says effort sustained over time matters more than getting it right immediately. The judge looked at her with an expression that was close to warmth. Dr. Hail sounds wise.

She is, Sophie said. And Victoria, she’s really smart and sometimes she’s impatient with things being disorganized, but she always explains things to me like I’m a real person and not a child. I like that. Is there anything you want the court to know? Judge Alderman said, “Anything you want me to understand about your situation?” Sophie was quiet for a moment.

She looked at her hands, then looked up at the judge with those direct, serious eyes. “My mom didn’t get to pick where I went,” she said. “I think she would have wanted to, but she ran out of time, and I didn’t get to pick either at first.” A pause. “But I would pick this. If I got to choose now, I would pick this.

I want the court to know that. The room was very quiet. Ethan looked at the table in front of him and breathed carefully. Judge Alderman made a note. She conferred briefly with Dana Flores. She looked at the documentation one more time. Then she set her glasses down and looked at the room. I’m granting permanent guardianship of Sophie Clare Whitmore to Ethan and Victoria Brooks, she said, with the option for formal adoption proceedings to be initiated by either party at any time.

She looked at Sophie. You have a family, young lady. Sophie looked back at her steadily. I know, she said. They went to the diner for lunch after the same one off the highway, the one with the vinyl boots and Donna who had seen them that first night with French fries and chocolate milk.

Donna recognized them, or at least recognized Sophie, and put them in the same booth and said, “Well, look at you all.” in the tone of someone who had formed an opinion about them on site 5 months ago and was satisfied to see the opinion confirmed. Sophie ordered French fries. Victoria ordered pie and actually ate it this time.

Ethan had a burger and said very little because there was a lot he was sitting with and the diner wasn’t the place for most of it. Sophie ate her French fries in the methodical way she had and didn’t perform any particular emotion about what had happened in the courtroom. But partway through the meal, she looked up at Ethan and said, “I’ve been practicing something.

” “Yeah,” he said. She looked at her plate. Then she looked at him. “Dad,” she said, not the way she’d said it in the fever, half-conscious, testing the word in the dark, fully awake at a diner table in April sunlight with her French fries and her green dress and the specific serious intent of someone who has decided something and is stating it.

He didn’t say anything. He couldn’t say anything for a moment. She looked at him with those eyes. “Is that okay?” “Yeah,” he said. His voice came out rough. He cleared his throat. “Yeah, that’s yeah.” She nodded once, satisfied, and went back to her fries. Donna appeared to refill coffee and gave Ethan a look that suggested she had witnessed the exchange and approved of it and was not going to make a production of it, which was exactly the right response.

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