Chapter 31 - THE APARTMENT WITH THE YELLOW CURTAINS
Naomi Calder invited me to her new apartment on the understanding that I was coming as a friend from the center, not as a caseworker investigating her life. She had moved after reviewing her safety plan with professionals who knew the details of her situation. The new building was small and noisy, with a laundromat downstairs and yellow curtains that caught the late-afternoon light. Theo had chosen them. He said they made the windows look like sunshine even on rainy days.
I brought a packet of seeds for the windowsill and a book about simple bridges. Theo took the book and disappeared into his room to examine the pictures. Naomi made tea in a chipped pot and sat across from me at a kitchen table crowded with school forms. She looked tired, but her shoulders no longer seemed drawn permanently toward her ears.
"I wanted you to see that we're all right," she said. "I know people at the center worry."
"We do care. But you don't owe us a demonstration."
She smiled faintly. "I'm starting to understand that."
She told me she'd decided to continue using some of the center's services while keeping certain communications through her advocate. She had asked for the right to review what information the center retained and when it would be deleted. Tessa had agreed to a clear schedule within the organization's legal requirements. Naomi was no longer asking for an impossible guarantee that nothing bad would happen. She was asking for a process she could see and question.
Theo emerged carrying the book. "Did you know a bridge can wiggle and still be safe?" he asked.
Naomi's apartment was small enough that I could hear the sound of Theo's construction project from the kitchen. Pieces of wood clicked against one another, followed by the soft scrape of a chair moving across the floor. His bedroom door stood open. I could see a blue blanket on his bed and a drawing of a train taped beside the window. There were no expensive decorations, but every object looked as though someone had chosen where it belonged.
"We did the unpacking ourselves," Naomi said. "Theo insisted on carrying his books because he didn't want anyone to put them in the wrong order."
"What order does he use?"
"One I haven't figured out yet. Apparently bridges come before birds, but dinosaurs can go anywhere."
I laughed. She poured tea into two chipped mugs and sat down. For a moment neither of us spoke. Then she asked whether I found it strange to visit a family I'd met through work. I told her I'd thought carefully about it and checked that it was appropriate before accepting. I didn't want the visit to blur her right to ask for different staff or formal support.
"I asked you because I wanted you to see us outside an office," she said. "You know what happened to the folder. You don't know much about our ordinary days."
She showed me a paper schedule on the refrigerator. Theo had drawn pictures beside each activity: a toothbrush for mornings, a bus for school, a spoon for dinner, and a tiny bridge for free time. Naomi explained that predictable routines helped him feel secure without requiring her to explain every adult decision. I admired the clarity of it.
Then she asked about my mother. I told her Mom was sewing cushions for a reading nook and had recently insisted on taking a bus route the transit app had declared impossible. Naomi laughed and said her own mother refused to use a smartphone. We exchanged stories about family members who could be stubborn, loving, and occasionally exhausting. The conversation was the first we'd had that wasn't organized around the missing folder.
Theo emerged carrying a bridge made from wooden sticks, string, and a surprising amount of tape. He placed it on the table and asked us to guess how many books it could hold. Naomi said two. I said three. He grinned and announced it could hold four, provided the books were small. We tested it with thin paperbacks. The bridge supported three, then collapsed when he added the fourth.
He stared at the pieces. I waited, expecting tears. Instead he asked for more tape. I handed him the roll and he began redesigning the support. Naomi watched with a soft expression.
"A year ago," she said quietly, "he would have cried because he thought a mistake meant somebody would get angry."
"Now he knows he can try again," I answered.
She nodded. "Most days. Not every day."
We didn't pretend his fear had vanished. He had made progress because the people around him had continued to offer steadiness, not because a single encouraging speech had cured anything.
In the afternoon Naomi's neighbor knocked to return a baking pan. She was an older woman who introduced herself as Mrs. Bellamy and immediately asked whether I wanted a piece of peach pie. I accepted before I could remember to be polite about refusing. We sat for ten minutes discussing the building's garden, which tenants were hoping to turn into a place where children could grow herbs. Theo offered to design the paths. Mrs. Bellamy said the committee would welcome a bridge expert.
When I left, Naomi walked me down the stairs. She thanked me for coming without asking her to give an account of every difficulty she'd endured. I told her I was grateful to see their new home, and that she could still tell the center when something wasn't working. She smiled.
On the bus I watched people carrying shopping bags and backpacks. I thought about how easily the word case could make a family disappear behind a set of documents. Theo was a boy who loved bridges. Naomi was a mother who needed reliable information and room to make decisions. Their lives were not a lesson arranged for me. I was fortunate to know a small part of them, and the responsibility of that knowledge was to respect its limits.
Before I left Naomi's building, Theo asked whether I could come back someday to see his finished bridge. I told him that any visit would be arranged with his mother and that I would be glad to hear how the project went. He seemed satisfied. As I reached the stairs, I heard him ask Naomi whether the window herbs would need a schedule. She told him plants did better with regular care, then asked if he wanted to help plan it. His voice rose with excitement. I smiled all the way to the bus stop. He was making a home through small decisions that belonged to him.
On the ride, I wrote Naomi a short message thanking her for the visit and reminding her that her service choices would not change because we'd shared tea. I checked the wording twice. Friendship mattered, but so did professional boundaries. I wanted both to be clear enough that nobody had to guess what was expected.
"I did, but I'd like you to explain it."
He described suspension cables with the seriousness of a small engineer. He was not trying to tell me his worries about home. He was telling me what interested him. I sat on the floor while he demonstrated with yarn and two overturned cups. When the bridge collapsed, he laughed and started again.
Later Naomi walked me to the bus stop. "Do you think the person who took the file was trying to hurt us?" she asked.
"I don't know. I know the risk was real, whatever their intention. I hope the investigation gives you a clearer answer."
"Sometimes I want to know everything. Other times I want to live a day without thinking about it."
"You can do both. You don't have to make the investigation your whole life."
The bus arrived with a squeal of brakes. I climbed aboard, carrying the image of yellow curtains and Theo laughing over a failed bridge. The story of the stolen folder mattered. So did the lives that continued outside it.
At home a message from Luca waited. Lily had decided to organize a neighborhood book exchange in Caroline's honor. She wanted to bring used books to the center, but Luca had told her to ask the staff first. I called her, and she described her plan with extraordinary enthusiasm. She wanted children to exchange books without having to explain why they could not afford new ones. She also wanted a rule against teasing anyone who preferred picture books.
"Those sound like good ideas," I said. "Let's talk to Tessa about how the exchange could work."
"Will people know it's Mom's idea?"
"They can know she liked books and art, if you want. But you can make the project yours too."
May you like
Lily thought for a moment. "Then it can be both."
I went to sleep imagining the reading nook filled with books chosen by children instead of donors. The next morning an investigator called to confirm that the photograph delivered to my apartment had been taken at a property associated with Blue Lantern. The exact date remained under review. That was a small step, not a revelation. I made a note and continued preparing for my placement assessment. My life had room for more than one kind of progress.
