“He already does.”
“What kind?”
“No painting in his kitchen.”
A few people smiled.
The judge continued.
“Why do you want to stay with him?”
Sky thought.
“Because he doesn’t ask me to pretend Luther didn’t exist.”
The judge waited.
“At North Creek they said I was stuck in the past.”
She looked at her hands.
“Maybe I was.”
Her voice became quieter.
“But he was my brother.”
“Tell me about the garage.”
“They let me paint.”
“Is that important?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s the only thing I’m good at.”
Gregory visibly reacted.
Sky corrected herself.
“The only thing I know I’m good at.”
“That’s different.”
Sky nodded.
The judge asked about the mural.
Sky opened her sketchbook.
Pages turned.
Luther.
Motorcycles.
Hands.
Fire.
Roads.
The jawbone emblem.
Then the mural concept.
The judge studied the drawings.
“Your brother taught you?”
“When I was little.”
“You remember that?”
“Some of it.”
“What did you learn after he died?”
“Most of it.”
“How?”
“I kept drawing until I stopped forgetting.”
That sentence changed Martha’s expression.
The judge closed the sketchbook.
The ruling was not permanent custody.
Martha had warned them.
The court granted Gregory Moss temporary guardianship and placement under strict supervision pending a full home study, additional background review, educational enrollment, counseling, and periodic child-services visits.
Sky would live at Gregory’s house.
Not the garage.
She could continue working on age-appropriate art projects there under supervision.
The court ordered further review of her prior placement and directed that no unrelated private investigator or third party contact her without going through her guardian, counsel, or authorized child-welfare personnel.
Michael Ventry’s suspected motive remained a separate matter.
The court did not treat club rumors as evidence.
Martha had insisted on that.
Afterward, outside the courthouse, Gregory offered her his hand.
Martha shook it.
“Do not make me regret this.”
“You have a warm personality.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.”
She pointed at him.
“School.”
“Yes.”
“Therapy.”
“Yes.”
“Home inspections.”
“Yes.”
“Curfew.”
Sky groaned.
Martha looked at her.
“Especially curfew.”
Sky rolled her eyes.
For once, rolling her eyes at an adult did not threaten her entire living situation.
That alone felt new.
Back at the garage, Jimmy had finished only the portions of the mural Sky had already fully designed.
He refused to complete her unfinished figure.
“That part’s yours.”
Sky stood before the wall.
Luther was in the center.
Alive in paint.
Gregory rode behind him.
Terry.
Jimmy.
Faces from photographs.
Faces from memory.
At the rear was the unfinished girl.
Jimmy handed Sky a brush.
“Finish it.”
She painted for almost two hours.
Nobody interrupted.
When she finally stepped back, the girl on the motorcycle had a face.
Sky’s.
But the motorcycle itself remained different from all the others.
Its outline was incomplete toward the rear wheel.
Gregory noticed.
“You forgot part.”
“No.”
“Then why isn’t it finished?”
Sky studied the wall.
“Because I don’t know where I’m going yet.”
Gregory smiled.
“Fair enough.”