Chapter 10 - His Empty Chair
Back at Grace's house Wednesday afternoon, Nathan printed the calendar for his meeting with Cho. The machine stopped halfway through September, asking for more paper. He replenished the tray and waited, his reflection floating over the dark window above the kitchen sink.
Every page was another record of a choice he had once called necessary.
In Grace's dining room, the pages lay between a bowl of wooden blocks and an abandoned slice of apple. Travel had a blue background on his calendar. Six weeks of blue looked nothing like the short departures he had explained individually to himself.
Grace pulled out the chair opposite him. “You ate nothing at lunch.”
“I'll eat after this.”
“Bring the plate with you.”
She put a sandwich beside the records and left him to read.
Nathan compared flights, hotel receipts, plant appointments, and calls home. He marked the dates without adding remembered conversations he could not verify. Sabrina's texts appeared alongside them: All fine here. Busy bedtime. Avery overtired, talk tomorrow.
He had accepted tomorrow again and again.
At the interview, Cho sat beside a family-services worker with a plain notebook. Neither asked Nathan to retell Avery's account. They already had the trained interview and medical information through the appropriate channels.
“We're establishing who was responsible for care and when,” Cho said. “And whether the current arrangement protects both children.”
Nathan handed over the copies. “The originals are preserved. These dates should match the travel records.”
The worker read his proposed plan: Grace's home; Nathan present overnight; Sabrina excluded from contact; familiar childcare with checks agreed through the agency; no questioning Avery about the allegations.
“Can your job accommodate this?” she asked.
“I've canceled travel. June is handling operations when I need to be away from the plant.”
“For how long?”
“I need a workable arrangement beyond this week. I'm building that.”
She wrote something down. He appreciated that she had not congratulated him for a few canceled flights.
Cho pointed to a September entry. “You flew out Tuesday morning and returned Friday night?”
“Yes.”
“Who checked on the children in person?”
Nathan opened his mouth. Sabrina had sent photographs from the breakfast table. He had heard Milo squeal over the telephone. Neither was a person visiting the house.
“No one independent,” he said.
“Did you ask your sister?”
“I told her Sabrina had it handled.”
The worker closed the calendar gently. “We need you to understand that accepting this plan today doesn't finish our assessment. We'll follow up.”
“I understand.”
“When the children come back to your house, we need to discuss that transition too. Familiar walls aren't always reassuring after a frightening experience.”
Nathan nodded. “They won't have to go back because I want my kitchen or my own bed. We'll work out what they need first.”
She made another note. The practical question steadied him more than reassurance could have.
Nathan returned to the factory for a scheduled conversation with a supervisor named Andre. Hannah had advised him to collect workplace information openly and preserve it, without trying to manufacture favorable statements.
Andre stood in the break room with his safety glasses pushed onto his head.
“You want me to say you couldn't help the travel?” he asked.
“I want what happened.”
Andre considered him. “We needed decisions. We didn't need you on every plane. I said that about Cleveland. You told me getting out of the house helped you think.”
Nathan remembered the trip. Remembered the clean hotel room, where no small clothes lay on Claire's side of the bed and no child asked whether heaven had weather.
“Put that in your notes,” he said.
Andre's expression softened without letting him off. “Okay.”
In Hannah's office afterward, she reviewed the notice for an October twenty-second special shareholders meeting. The governing papers allowed the proposed director-removal business, she explained, but the trust's voting authority remained disputed. A meeting notice created a lawful opportunity; it did not supply votes they did not yet have.
“My twenty-five percent isn't enough,” Nathan said.
“Correct. Victor holds forty-five. The children's thirty percent needs proper, independent representation before we can rely on it.”
He read every page this time, including the stated business, delivery requirements, and recipient list. Hannah sent the notices that afternoon through the required channels, including notice to both current trustees in their capacities. She saved the delivery records.
“Fifteen days,” she said. “October seventh to the twenty-second. We aren't improvising this at the door.”
His phone vibrated with a message from Lila. She had attached her own scheduling log and asked where to send the preserved messages.
Hannah gave him the secure destination. Nathan thanked Lila without asking her to fill gaps with guesses.
The log placed her last week of work beside Sabrina's preparations to move into the house. It contained ordinary instructions about snacks, a shoe appointment, Milo's nap. Then Nathan's written message canceling Lila's next shift after the earring accusation.
He read his own sentence twice: We need some space while we sort this out.
He had given the wrong people space.
At Grace's that evening, Avery sat on the rug, sorting blocks by color. Nathan lowered himself nearby.
“Can you stay when it's dark?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Even if your phone says work?”
“I've arranged help at work. I'll be here.”
She nodded, testing one blue block against another. He waited until she offered him a red one. For ten minutes, that was his entire job.
After both children settled, Hannah called. Sabrina's lawyer had submitted a document to the investigating agency and copied counsel. It was labeled Household Behavior Support Plan. Sabrina said Nathan had approved it.
“Have you seen it before?” Hannah asked.
May you like
The attachment opened. At the bottom of its first page, beside reassuring phrases about consistent routines, Nathan saw his own initials.
He remembered a stack of papers on the kitchen counter. He remembered Sabrina saying there was nothing in them he needed to worry about.
