Chapter 12

      ALEX

      The second to last day of camp Ramon runs right to me as soon as he comes in the doors of the gym. I crouch down, give him my biggest smile. He’s opened up these last few days, smiling more, laughing a little, his eyes lighting before his long, curly lashes sweep downwards. Today though he hugs me almost fiercely, burying his head in my shoulder. I can feel the tension in his little body and I ease away.

      “Hey…hey. You okay, buddy?” I realize I shouldn’t have asked, because his expression irons out and he turns away from me. I feel a twinge of concern, a lurch of fear.

      I don’t think much more about Ramon until he comes in for his art session towards the end of the day. I’m so busy, cranking out class after class of boisterous kids, trying to keep them focused and interested and the paint off the walls or each other. Camp is coming to an end so they’re more hyper than usual, and several times jokes turn into fights and I’m wading right into the middle, separating them with heavy hands on shoulders, even as part of me longs to curl inward and protect the vulnerable barely-there curve of my belly. Even now, I think of it. Always, I think of it.

      Ramon sits by himself during art, his bent arm hiding his paper. He lowers his head, his silky hair obscuring his face, everything hidden, protected, just as it was the first day, and I wonder what is going on and if his mother knows. If she worries. Motherhood is such a leap into the unknown, into the exposed emotions like peeled-back skin, and I’m glad I won’t have to feel all that. That will be Martha’s job.

      But will I feel it? Will I not be able to resist? I already feel it, a little bit, with Ramon, and it hurts.

      “Hey, buddy.” I come closer, touch his head just lightly because there are always rules about touching. I’ve broken too many by allowing him to hug me when he arrived. “What are you drawing?” I ask and crane my neck to see but he moves his arm and shows me anyway.

      And that’s when I see it. Not the drawing, which I barely glance at, but the perfectly round circle, red and livid, on his inner elbow. It looks—and in my job I’ve seen them before—like a cigarette-burn mark.

      Everything in me sinks with dread. I manage to say something about his drawing even as my brain buzzes.

      As a teacher, I am legally required to report suspected child abuse. I make a call to Child Protective Services and within forty-eight hours I must file a written report. My part then is essentially done, and they take over. They might remove Ramon from his home, put him in temporary foster care. They might contact the police, if it appears the abuse is not from a family member. There could, in rare instances, be a court case, and I might be called to testify. But the likelihood is I’ll never see Ramon again and I’ll never even know what happens to him.

      I’m cold, so cold, as I walk through the art room, murmuring encouragement and praise. I don’t want to call CPS. I never do, because it’s awful and ugly and yet so often necessary. I’ve done it twice before, and both cases were most certainly warranted. I don’t know what happened to either of the children involved, but already I feel more invested in this—in Ramon—than I ever did before.

      I’m thinking about Ramon, but I’m also thinking about his mom. I remember how she smiled at him when she picked him up. How tired and pinched she looked, and part of me thinks, She’’s doing her best. Isn’’t that all any of us can do?

      And after all, it’s one little mark. It might not be a cigarette burn. Hell, it could be anything. A birthmark. An accident. Anything at all.

      I drift through the rest of the day, and when Ramon’s mother comes to collect him I move forward impulsively, smile at her even as I search her face for clues, her body for bruises.

      “Hi, I just wanted to let you know how much I’m enjoying having Ramon at camp. He’s a budding artist, really takes his time with things.”

      She stares at me, a little surprised, a little wary, and says nothing. She tugs at Ramon’s hand and says something to him in Spanish. And then they’re walking out of the gym, and I just stand there, undecided. Undecided about so much.

      I decide not to call today. I’ll see Ramon tomorrow, get a better look at the mark. I know I’m rationalizing, at least a little, but I also know what it could be like with a low-income Hispanic woman. She might not even have a chance.

      Still I feel as if I’m hiding something as I help clean and lock up the center. Normally I would tell Jim, the director of the camp, about my suspicions. But really, what is there to say? I barely know Ramon, and I didn’t get a good look at that mark. Even so, everything in me churns with fear for Ramon, sympathy for his mother.

      I push it all out of my mind, or try to. It’s a beautiful day, a light breeze keeping it from being too hot, and I stop by the farmers’ market at Union Square. I love walking by all the stalls, the mounds of grapes and punnets of juicy red strawberries, soaps and honey from farms upstate. I buy three perfectly ripe peaches and a punnet of strawberries, my mouth watering at the thought of them.

      Back in my apartment I wash and slice up all the fruit and put it in a bowl. I sit on my futon with the window open and the breeze blowing over me, and eat it for dinner. Such a simple act, and yet with it something in me loosens, lightens. This is me, I think. This is the me I’ve been missing, the me who enjoys the simple sweetness of fruit, my independence, the freedom and joy found in this moment.

      I go to bed happier than I’ve been in a long time, since I first took that pregnancy test. And the next morning when I come to the community center Ramon doesn’t show up.

      At first I don’t notice because I assume he’s just late. And then I’m busy with classes and kids and chaos, and I don’t think about it again until his class troops in for