Chapter 17
Grant’s visits became longer when Noah was seven.
Slowly.
No dramatic transition.
One hour.
Then ninety minutes.
Then two hours.
Still supervised.
Grant complied with every requirement.
Domestic-violence treatment.
Parenting work.
No contact with Isabella outside approved channels.
No discussion of Lombardi business with Noah.
No Vanessa.
The last condition mattered.
Noah eventually asked why.
“Why Aunt Vanessa can't come?”
The supervisor looked toward Grant.
Grant did not answer immediately.
Good.
“Because she did things that hurt Mom.”
Noah frowned.
“You hurt Mom.”
“Yes.”
“And you here.”
That landed.
Grant took time.
“Different adults have different rules.”
“Why?”
“Because the people deciding what's safe looked at different things we did.”
Technically true.
Still incomplete.
Noah waited.
Grant added:
“And because seeing me doesn't mean you have to see everyone connected to me.”
Better.
Noah looked at the toy train between them.
“Do you see Aunt Vanessa?”
“Sometimes.”
“Do you like her?”
“She’s my sister.”
“That not answer.”
Apparently inherited from Isabella.
Grant almost smiled.
“I love her.”
“Do you like?”
“Sometimes.”
Good enough.
Noah pushed the train.
Then:
“She ripped flower.”
Grant became still.
Vanessa had not ripped the flower.
She had mocked it.
Grant had destroyed the display cart during the confrontation.
Memory at seven was not a transcript.
He corrected carefully.
“She said bad things about the flower.”
Noah frowned.
“Then who ripped?”
Grant looked down.
The flower had been torn during the showroom chaos.
He had never actually asked whose hand caused the final tear.
That uncertainty mattered.
“I don't know exactly.”
Noah stared.
“You were there.”
“Yes.”
“So?”
Grant felt something uncomfortable.
Being present did not create certainty.
A lesson Isabella had been forced to learn the hard way.
“I still don't know.”
Noah accepted that badly.
Then:
“You didn't take it.”
Grant looked at him.
“What?”
“When I gave.”
The first flower.
The one Noah had held out proudly.
Grant had not taken it.
He had been angry.
Distracted.
Vanessa had mocked it.
Isabella had intervened.
Then everything exploded.
Grant remembered the paper petals on the carpet.
“No.”
“Why?”
There were many answers.
He had been arguing with Isabella.
Embarrassed by Noah interrupting.
Angry that the boy had made something childish in front of collectors.
Worried about appearances.
None improved with age.
“I thought other things mattered more.”
Noah looked confused.
“Than flower?”
“Yes.”
“That’s stupid.”
“Yes.”
Grant did not say:
I was stressed.
Noah already knew adults had reasons.
He was learning reasons were not permission.
At the next visit Grant brought colored paper.
Not a finished flower.
Materials.
Noah looked at them.
“You making?”
“If you want.”
They sat together.
Grant folded the stem wrong.
Noah corrected him.
“No.”
“What?”
“This side.”
Grant changed it.
The flower came out crooked.
Noah looked at it.
“Bad.”
Grant laughed.
“Yes.”
Noah made another.
Better.
At the end Grant asked:
“Can I keep mine?”
Noah shrugged.
“You made.”
Right.
Not every object had to belong to the child because adults felt guilty.
Grant took the crooked flower home.
He did not frame it.
Did not photograph it for court.
Did not send Isabella a message.
He put it on his kitchen counter.
Paper.
Green stem.
Uneven petals.
May you like
His.
That mattered too.
