I shook my head before she could apologize.
“He’s cried on me too,” I said.
Her eyes flicked up.
“A horse can cry?”
“In his own way.”
She looked at Titan.
Titan snorted softly, as if offended by the whole conversation.
That got the smallest twitch at the corner of her mouth.
Not a smile.
Not yet.
But the first crack in the concrete.
June saw it too.
I could tell because her eyes watered, and she quickly looked down at her papers like the pages had suddenly become very important.
“We should go,” June said. “The foster family is expecting us back.”
Emily’s face closed.
Just like that.
The barn got cold around her again.
She handed me the lead rope like it weighed a hundred pounds.
“Can I come back?” she asked, without looking at me.
“If you want to.”
“What if they say no?”
I glanced at June.
June’s face tightened.
That was when I first understood this wasn’t going to be simple.
Some children arrive carrying fear.
Some arrive carrying a whole room full of adults who disagree about what healing should look like.
June cleared her throat.
“We’ll do what we can.”
Emily heard the answer inside the answer.
Kids like us always do.
She gave Titan one last look.
Then she walked out of the barn with her shoulders back up around her ears.
Titan watched her go.
He didn’t make a sound until the car disappeared down the gravel road.
Then he let out a low, aching whinny that hit me right in the ribs.
“I know, buddy,” I whispered.
But I didn’t know.
Not yet.
The next morning, June called before sunrise.
I was carrying grain buckets across the yard when my phone buzzed in my coat pocket.
The sky was still gray.
The horses were making soft impatient noises in their stalls.
I answered with my shoulder pressed against the phone.
“Leo Mercer.”
“It’s June.”
Her voice was careful.
Too careful.
My stomach dropped.
“Is Emily okay?”
“She’s safe,” June said quickly. “She’s physically safe.”
That word physically does a lot of ugly work in sentences like that.
I set the grain bucket down.
“What happened?”
“She refused breakfast. Refused school. Refused to speak to her foster parents. Then she packed her backpack and sat by the door.”
“Why?”
“She said Titan was expecting her.”
I closed my eyes.
June sighed.
