“Owen.”
“I didn’t read private stuff,” he said. “Well… not on purpose.”
That got another laugh.
But I felt something shift.
I remembered the box.
A battered blue storage box Owen had carried from Mrs. Parker’s garage one Saturday afternoon. He’d asked whether old school yearbooks could be looked up online.
At the time, I’d barely thought about it.
Owen glanced at his music teacher, Ms. Delgado.
She nodded encouragement.
“In the box were letters from old students,” Owen said. “A lot of them.”
Mrs. Parker lowered her head.
“Some said thank you. Some said they were sorry they never said thank you. Some said they became teachers because of you.”
He looked toward the twelve adults.
“So I asked Ms. Delgado if we could find some of them.”
Mrs. Parker’s eyes widened.
“You did this?”
Owen nodded.
“For three months.”
My mouth fell open.
Three months?
Suddenly I remembered all the evenings he’d claimed he needed the computer for school research. All the whispered phone calls with his grandmother. All the times he’d asked strangely specific questions about social media.
