Chapter 3

3: 3

The day I was discharged, Dad didn't come to get me.

Mom said he was busy putting together the paperwork to sue the school, and that he still had to answer questions for the rescue command team.

Ryan sat in a wheelchair, pushed to the elevator doors by an aide.

His legs weren't actually hurt, but Mom said he'd had a scare and was afraid to walk.

My left foot still couldn't take any weight, so all I could do was lean against the wall and inch along.

The nurse couldn't stand it and went to find another wheelchair.

"They're both children. You can't only look after one of them."

Mom's face went stiff.

"Celine's been independent since she was little. She doesn't like people helping her."

I sat down in the wheelchair and didn't tell the nurse that it wasn't that I didn't like help.

When I was small and scraped my knee, I'd reached out for a hug too.

Mom had been sponging down Ryan while he ran a fever, and just told me to go find a bandage myself.

Later I reached out less and less, and they all started calling me such a sensible girl.

Once we got home, I found my bed had been moved into the living room.

Mom explained that Ryan cried whenever he heard a door shut, so for now he was staying in my room, where it was easier to keep an eye on him.

"Then where do I sleep?"

"The couch is plenty wide. Besides, you get up at night, and the living room's closer to the bathroom."

My desk was covered with Ryan's medicine and toys.

That dinosaur backpack sat right in the middle, dust from the tunnel still caught in the zipper.

When Ryan saw me staring at it, he snatched it up in a hurry.

"I didn't mean to take your room, Celine."

"What exactly did Dad say that day?"

His eyes went red at once.

Mom came out carrying a cup of water and stepped between us.

"Why do you keep pushing Ryan like this? He's only eight, he's been through something awful, and you still want him to testify for you?"

"I just want to know."

"And what good does knowing do? You won't be satisfied until you can prove your own parents left you there on purpose?"

The cup came down hard on the table.

I didn't ask again.

That afternoon, Steve came by with a technician and took away my phone-watch.

The watch still wouldn't turn on after drying out, but the call records inside might be recoverable.

Dad came out of the study and blocked the door.

"It's a child's belongings. Who said you could just take it?"

Steve showed him the accident investigation team's paperwork.

"There's a discrepancy between the written statement the family submitted and the information from the scene. We need to verify it."

Dad's face darkened.

"What discrepancy?"

Steve didn't answer right away.

"In your statement, you wrote that you didn't know Celine Fox was on the bus."

"I didn't know."

"The red distress beacon on the bus has seven presses logged," Steve said. "On the fifth press, the girl inside said she was still in the back row."

Dad's fingers twitched.

"That light doesn't transmit a signal in real time." He said it fast. "The tunnel was all rock. Who knows what it actually recorded in there."

The technician looked up.

"On this model, it's true that the distress signals didn't all get transmitted. After the collapse, the steel roof panel crushed the positioning module, so the data was only stored on the chip in the unit itself."

"So the fact that the rescue team didn't hear those calls at the time doesn't mean the child never pressed it," Steve said. "What we need to verify now is whether, after the child called for help, someone gave the rescue team the opposite information."

Mom came out of the kitchen with a cup of water.

"The scene was chaos. It's perfectly normal to say a wrong word or two. Instead of investigating the school, you turn around and suspect the parents?"

Steve looked at her.

"The problem with the school's roster will be investigated. So will the recordings from the rescue dispatch desk and the on-scene confirmation forms."

Dad's mouth was set tight.

"The recordings are all just noise. What can they prove?"

"Whether they prove anything can wait until the technical verification is finished." Steve handed the waterproof case with the watch to the technician. "On the day of the hearing, the relevant equipment and the dispatch records will all be present."

Three days later, the school and the rescue command team notified us to attend the accident hearing.

When Dad got the notice, he called the lawyer first, then wrote my name into the witness list.

That evening he laid the revised written statement on the coffee table.

This time it said that I had boarded the bus on a whim, that my memory was muddled after the accident, and that I'd mistakenly believed my parents had once given instructions.

"The lawyer says you're young, it's perfectly normal to remember things wrong, and no one will blame you."

Dad pushed a pen toward me.

I didn't take it. I just looked at the last page.

Attached there was a record of family conversations, saying my parents had repeatedly taught me not to fight over things and to look after my fostered cousin.

Mom sat down beside me.

"Don't say anything you shouldn't at the hearing. Once this is over, we're still a family."

"And if I don't do what you're telling me?"

Dad gathered up the documents.

"You eat our food, you live under our roof. Where else are you going to go?"

My bed was right behind him, in the living room.

In the daytime the blanket had to be folded up to clear a space for Ryan to play, and my backpack could only be shoved under the shoe cabinet.

I bowed my head and opened my phone, and in the hearing list I saw another line.

Accident vehicle emergency equipment technician, to appear with the red distress beacon.