“Hey, Eli,” Doc said, speaking through the window like through a doorway. “Can you hear my voice? We’re going to help you out. One hand on June’s shoulder. One hand to me.”
A beat. Then a small face appeared, pale under a mop of wet bangs. He did not cry. He looked at June’s shoulder like it was a number on a page and he’d been asked to add to it. He placed his hand there and lifted his knee. Doc gathered him with the careful firmness of someone who had practiced on watermelons and nieces.
When Eli reached the bank, he put both hands flat on the towel like he needed to feel the shape of dry. “Name?” Ms. Patel asked, calmer now that the list had a check mark made by a child’s breath.
“Eli,” he said, almost apologizing.
“Eli is safe,” she said, and under the pizza-box roster, the woman added a little star.
