"I was driving back with an alternator for your customer." She lifted an eyebrow. "I know that. I wrote the delivery request myself. I'm telling you what people are saying because somebody started them talking."
He reached for the phone again. A new message from Ron appeared on the screen as he watched. It asked Eli to contact him privately regarding a job reinstatement opportunity and an important clarification of the incident. The language was courteous.
The timing was not. Eli showed it to Mara. She read it once and handed the phone back. "Call a lawyer before you call him," she said.
Eli had never hired a lawyer outside the paperwork required after Natalie's death. His experience with legal professionals consisted mostly of bills and a court appointment he had needed to settle a hospital account. Mara made a call to a local employment attorney named Angela Ruiz, whose office occasionally helped small businesses navigate safety disputes. Ruiz agreed to speak with Eli that afternoon without charging for an initial consultation.
When the doctor finally discharged him, Eli walked slowly through the hospital lobby and stopped beside the automatic doors. A television above the coffee stand showed footage of the burned red truck, shot from across the roadway by a passing motorist. The caption identified Ward Industrial Vehicles and said investigators were reviewing the cause of a vehicle fire involving a company demonstrator. The report mentioned a child who had been rescued by a passerby.
Eli watched the image of the truck and tried to reconcile it with the narrow space through which he had helped Tommy. The fire had looked enormous from inside the event. On the television it appeared as a small violent island amid rain, passing headlights, and people keeping their distance. The difference made him uneasy. A headline could compress a complicated series of decisions into something simple enough to repeat, and that was exactly how people like Ron Keller gained room to move.
At home, Sophie met him at the door before he had turned the handle completely. She slowed when she saw the bandage, unsure whether she was allowed to hug him. Eli crouched as much as his aching back permitted and held out his uninjured arm. She buried her face in his shoulder and stayed there long enough for him to feel her breathing become steady. The stuffed fox was tucked under one elbow.
"Did you bring the boy home?" she asked against his shirt. "No," Eli said. "His mother was with him at the hospital. He has his own home to go to."
Sophie thought about that and pulled back far enough to inspect his face. "Then somebody should make sure his truck is safe before he gets in it again." Eli kissed the top of her head. "That's what I'm hoping happens."
The duplex looked the same as it had the day before: a laundry basket beside the sofa, the little dining table covered in school papers, and a cracked dish waiting in the sink. Eli found he loved the ordinary disorder with an almost painful intensity. At the hospital he had imagined