Chapter 2 - The Yellow Book
Maya stared at the messages while Tony stacked chairs around her.
“Everything all right?”
“I don’t know.”
She showed him the screen.
Tony read it without touching the phone.
“Children tear pages out of things.”
“Maybe.”
But Sophia had not asked whether the book was safe.
She had asked Maya to keep a particular adult away from it.
That difference remained with her all the way home.
Her apartment in Queens consisted of a bedroom, a narrow kitchen, and a radiator that treated warmth as an unpredictable personal favor.
She placed her grandmother’s recipe notebook on the table and opened it at random.
Almond cookies.
Beside the ingredients, her grandmother had written a reminder in Chinese: Let them cool before you decide they are too soft.
Maya smiled tiredly.
Then her phone rang.
Dante.
“I’m sorry it’s late.”
“It is.”
“I don’t know whether I should be worried about this.”
Maya leaned against the counter.
“I’m not qualified to tell you what it means. Bring it to the appointment tomorrow.”
A pause.
“Yes.”
“How is she?”
“Asleep.”
“In her bed?”
“Yes.”
“That’s good.”
“She asked whether you could visit.”
Maya closed her eyes.
There it was.
The request she had known would come.
“I work two jobs.”
“I can compensate you.”
“That isn’t the only issue.”
He waited.
“I’m not a therapist. I’m not trained to care for a child going through this. If I visit, it needs to be as someone she met and liked. Not someone you expect to fix her.”
His answer came more slowly this time.
“Understood.”
“And you need to tell the person she’s seeing about me.”
“I will.”
They arranged a brief visit the following afternoon, before Maya’s restaurant shift, with Dante present.
She would be paid for the time she otherwise would have spent working.
The amount was ordinary.
She insisted on that too.
The Russo house stood on a quiet Upper East Side street behind a dark iron gate.
A woman in a cream blouse opened the door.
“You’re Maya.”
It was not a question.
“Yes.”
“I’m Nora. Mr. Russo is upstairs.”
Her smile never quite reached her eyes.
Maya handed over her coat.
Before she could ask where to wait, small footsteps sounded on the staircase.
Sophia appeared holding a yellow sketchbook against her chest.
“You came.”
“I said I’d try.”
Sophia took her hand.
Nora moved forward.
“Miss Sophia, you should ask before pulling guests around.”
The child released Maya immediately.
Dante appeared above them.
“She’s fine, Nora.”
The housekeeper stepped back.
In the sitting room, Dante explained that the morning appointment had gone gently. The child psychologist, Dr. Harris, had recommended predictable routines and less pressure to talk.
“She said your visit was all right,” he added. “As long as nobody turns it into a test.”
“Good.”
Sophia settled on the rug.
Maya sat nearby instead of reaching for the book.
“What are you drawing?”
“A garden.”
“Can I see?”
Sophia opened it.
There were flowers with enormous yellow heads, a purple dog, and a house with windows on every available surface.
Then came the missing pages.
Three rough edges near the center.
Sophia turned past them quickly.
Maya did not stop her.
They drew for twenty minutes.
Dante stayed nearby, answering emails until Maya quietly asked whether the phone could wait.
He looked surprised.
Then he put it away.
Sophia watched that exchange with intense interest.
Eventually, she offered him a crayon.
“Your flower needs a stem.”
He obeyed.
When Nora entered carrying juice, Sophia shut the sketchbook.
The movement was small.
Maya noticed.
So did Dante.
“Nora,” he said, “would you give us some time?”
The woman placed the tray down carefully.
“Of course.”
After she left, Sophia opened to the final page.
There was a drawing of a woman in a red coat.
Beneath it, in adult handwriting, someone had written:
I will come back Friday. Love, Mama.
Dante leaned forward.
“Who wrote that?”
Sophia’s shoulders rose.
Maya looked at him.
He took a breath.
“Was it Mommy?”
A nod.
“Before she left?”
Another nod.
He looked at the sentence again.
Today was Friday.
His phone lay dark on the table.
Maya could see him remembering something, fitting it against a version of events that no longer sat comfortably.
“What were the missing pages?” she asked softly.
Sophia stared at her drawing.
“Letters.”
“Letters like the alphabet?”
A shake of her head.
“Mommy’s letters.”
Dante went very still.
After a moment, he said, “I was told she left a note saying she wasn’t coming back.”
Sophia’s eyes filled.
“She said Friday.”
Maya rested her hands in her lap, resisting the urge to turn the moment into an interrogation.
“Then we should let the grown-ups work out what happened.”
Sophia looked at her father.
“Mommy didn’t go on a plane.”
The room became silent.
May you like
Outside the doorway, something clicked softly against the floor.
When Dante stood and opened the door, Nora was walking away.
