“She signed a bunch of places. Then Uncle Jason folded everything really fast.”
I stood up without realizing I had moved.
“Was there anything else?”
Tyler suddenly started crying harder.
“He came back at night once.”
I looked down at him.
“What?”
“You were sleeping.”
“When?”
“I don’t know. Last week, maybe.”
“How did he get inside?”
Tyler looked confused by the question.
“With his key.”
Of course.
The key I had given him.
“Why didn’t you wake me?”
The second I asked, Tyler’s face changed.
And before he answered, I knew I was going to hate myself.
“Because you told me to stop following him.”
I felt as though someone had struck me.
Tyler wiped his nose against his sleeve.
“I thought you’d get mad.”
“Oh, sweetheart…”
“He went into Grandma’s room and told her she’d signed something in the wrong place.”
I looked at the pillow on the floor.
Then the blanket.
Then my little boy sitting there trying desperately to stay awake.
“Is that why you’ve been sleeping outside her door?”
Tyler nodded.
“I tried to watch.”
His voice broke.
