“Is it bad, Neve?” he asked.
I folded the paper in half. “It’s just paper. Paper likes to pretend it’s important.”
He didn’t smile back at that.
A couple of hours later, a woman working for someone named Augusta called me directly — mother of an inmate named Ezra, she explained, having tracked down my name through the legal aid office after I’d filed for rental assistance and guardianship paperwork covering Caleb. That alone should have been more than enough reason to simply hang up on her immediately.
Instead I stayed on the line, because desperation always manages to steal one more second of your attention than you meant to give it. My landlord wanted his money. Caleb needed new shoes. Pride had never once covered an electric bill in my entire life. I genuinely had no real choice in the matter, so I agreed to meet her in person.
Augusta’s office smelled of lemon polish and old, settled wealth. “I have a shift starting in an hour,” I told her.
“I’ll be brief, then,” she said, folding both hands neatly together. “I’m offering you two thousand dollars a month.”
