She had not slept.
She said: the woman who came to my window wasn’t you.
She described the ring.
An emerald with two small diamonds.
I sat on the kitchen floor when she told me.
Not because my legs gave out.
Because I needed to be on the floor for a moment.
Because the ground needed to be real.
She had said: I told her I loved it. She said it was her grandmother’s.
I asked if she would say that in court.
She said: honey, why do you think I called?
She came.
She shook when she stood up, but she stood.
The hearing began.
Thomas’s lawyer presented the withdrawal slips.
He said: sixty-one thousand dollars, Your Honor.
He said: four withdrawals in four weeks.
He said: my client was in North Dakota.
He said: my client was working.
He presented the information with the confidence of someone who has done this many times and who knows what it looks like when the evidence is thorough.
