Eli stared at the diagram on the table.
“He sounds like someone I should’ve known better.”
“Yes,” Boon said. “He was.”
There was no consolation in the answer.
That made it consoling.
The evening before the hearing, Raina came by with Attorney Mina Cho, the lawyer retained to represent the guardianship petition.
Cho was in her early forties, compact and exact, with dark hair cut to her jaw and a habit of arranging papers so their edges aligned before beginning any conversation. Eli liked her immediately for this, though he did not say so.
They sat at the kitchen table.
“I want to explain tomorrow without legal fog,” Cho said. “The county is not deciding whether Darla loves you. It is deciding whether your current care arrangement is safe and sustainable.”
Darla nodded.
“If Judge Parwick grants temporary guardianship to Raina, your mother does not stop being your mother,” Cho continued. “She retains rights defined by the order. The purpose is to stabilize care while she continues treatment and while the county monitors progress.”
“How temporary?” Eli asked.
“Initial review in ninety days.”
“And then?”
“The judge looks at evidence. School attendance. Darla’s treatment participation. Home stability. Your needs. Your wishes.”
“My wishes actually matter?”
Cho looked at him.
“They should always matter. Legally, at thirteen, they matter significantly, though they are not the only factor.”
Eli glanced at Raina.
“What if I want to spend nights here?”
Cho answered before Raina could.
“We can request a schedule that preserves time with Darla if the court approves and the county supports it.”
Darla’s shoulders relaxed slightly.
“What if I mess up?” she asked.
Cho’s expression softened.
“Then you tell the truth about the mess-up and keep working. Courts are more comfortable with documented struggle than hidden instability.”
Raina looked at Darla.
“Sound familiar?”
Darla smiled without humor.
“Unfortunately.”
Eli waited until Cho finished reviewing the paperwork.
Then he asked the question he had been carrying since Raina confessed at two-thirty in the morning.
“What about the signature?”
Cho stopped.
Raina looked at him.
Darla frowned.
“What signature?”
Raina answered.
“I signed your name to the school evaluation consent when you had not signed it by the deadline.”
Darla stared at her.
“You forged my signature.”
“Yes.”
Cho closed her eyes for half a second.
“You didn’t tell me this,” she said.
“I am telling you now.”
“Because Eli asked?”
“Because it needs to be in the open before we enter a courtroom.”
Darla’s anger appeared slowly.
“You had no right.”
“I know.”
“You don’t get to decide I’m too broken to sign my own child’s papers.”
“I know.”
“Stop saying you know.”
Raina absorbed the words without defense.