The first night without my parents was longer than I knew a night could be.
I was taken somewhere with bright lights and plastic chairs.
People spoke to me gently.
They asked questions.
I gave short answers.
Sometimes I didn't answer at all.
I kept expecting someone to tell me that Arthur and Evelyn had been found.
Or that they had called.
Or that there had been some mistake.
Nobody did.
A woman from child services explained that they were trying to contact my family.
I asked when I could go home.
She said she didn't know yet.
I didn't like that answer.
But I didn't argue.
I had learned something at the bus station.
Adults could say they would do something without telling you when they planned to do it.
I spent hours in waiting rooms.
The chairs were uncomfortable.
A television played cartoons without much sound.
I watched the characters move their mouths.
I couldn't remember what any of them were saying.
Sometimes somebody offered me food.
Sometimes I ate.
Other times I pushed the plate away.
I didn't know whether my parents were looking for me.
I didn't know whether they knew where I was.
I only knew that nobody had come through the door.
When someone mentioned the possibility that I might have to stay somewhere else, I asked whether my mother would be allowed to visit.
The woman hesitated.
Then she said they would have to see what happened.
I hated that answer too.
Days passed.
I was moved between rooms and introduced to people who wanted to know about my life.
They asked about school.
They asked about my parents.
They asked whether I had brothers or sisters.
I answered what I could.
I was too young to understand the paperwork.
I was old enough to understand that adults were making decisions about me.
One afternoon, I was sitting alone when a man walked into the room.
He looked like he had entered the wrong place.
He glanced toward the hallway, then back at the room.
He was an older man.
Fifty-three, I learned later.
He wore a brown corduroy jacket with worn patches around the elbows.
His shoes were ordinary.
His hair was neat.
Nothing about him suggested that he would become the most important person in my life.
He looked at me.
Then he looked at the empty chairs.
He could have continued down the hallway.
He could have apologized and left.
Instead, he approached.
"Mind if I sit?"
I shrugged.
He sat down beside me.
For a little while, neither of us spoke.
I was used to people asking questions.
This man didn't immediately ask where my parents were.
He didn't ask why I was there.
He didn't look at me with the expression adults wore when they were trying to hide their sadness.
He reached into his jacket.
Then he pulled out a small magnetic chess set.
It was old.
The corners of the case were worn.
He opened it carefully and placed it between us.
"Have you ever played chess?"
I shook my head.
He looked at the board.
"That's all right. Neither did I when I started."
I didn't believe him.
He smiled a little.
Then he showed me the pieces.
He explained that each one moved differently.
I listened.
I didn't understand everything.
But I liked the way he moved the pieces slowly.
There was no hurry.
For the first time in several days, someone was sitting beside me without asking me to explain why I was alone.
His name was Elijah.
He told me he volunteered at a community center.
He had come to the building for something related to that work and had taken the wrong hallway while searching for an elevator.
He hadn't planned to meet me.
I hadn't planned to meet him either.
He stayed for a while.
Then he closed the chess set and stood.
"I'll see you another time, if that's all right."
I didn't answer.
He didn't demand one.
He simply left.
I watched the doorway after he disappeared.
I didn't know whether he meant what he said.
The following week, he came back.
I recognized the brown jacket.
He carried the same little chess set.
He sat beside me again.
We played.
Or rather, he played while I tried to understand what I was doing.
I moved a piece in the wrong direction.
He showed me how it worked.
I made another mistake.
He explained it again.
He never sounded irritated.
That mattered more than I could have told him.
The next week, he returned.
Then he returned again.
It became something I could expect.
I started recognizing his footsteps.
I knew the sound of the chess case opening.
I knew he would put the pieces back in their places before leaving.
Sometimes I spoke.
Sometimes I didn't.
Elijah never treated my silence like a problem he needed to solve.
He allowed it to exist.
That was different from the other adults.
They wanted answers.
He seemed content to let me be a child for a little while.
One afternoon, I forgot how the knight moved.
I had been taught already.
I knew that.
I looked at the board and felt embarrassed.
Elijah leaned forward.
"Let's go through it again."
He showed me.
I tried.
I got it wrong.
He showed me once more.
No sigh.
No impatient look.
Nothing.
I remember thinking that perhaps he had a lot of free time.
I didn't understand yet that he was choosing to spend it with me.
The brown jacket became familiar.
So did the chessboard.
I started talking more.
Not about the bus station.
Not about my parents.
Mostly about ordinary things.
Things I had seen.
Things I remembered from school.
Things I wanted to know.
Elijah listened.
He didn't pretend every little thing I said was important.
He simply paid attention.
And for a child who had spent days wondering whether anyone would return for him, attention felt enormous.
Months passed.
There were still decisions being made about where I would live.
Elijah was involved in those conversations.
He didn't promise that everything would be easy.
He didn't tell me I would never be hurt again.
He understood that promises could be dangerous when they came too quickly.
One day, he sat across from me with the chessboard between us.
He looked unusually serious.
"I want to ask you something, Matthew."
I put down the piece I was holding.
He told me he wanted to give me a home.
Not a temporary room.
Not another place where I would have to wonder how long I was allowed to stay.
A home.
He said there were things the adults would need to arrange.
He explained that it would take time.
Then he told me something I never forgot.
I didn't have to trust him just because he wanted to help me.
He would have to earn that.
I looked at the chessboard.
I looked at his worn jacket.
I thought about all the times he had come back when he didn't have to.
I didn't know how to explain what I felt.
So I gave him the only answer I had.
I wanted to go with him.
He didn't celebrate loudly.
He didn't make a speech.
He just nodded.
Then he reached across the table and straightened one of the chess pieces I had knocked over.
For the first time since the Greyhound station, I could imagine waking up somewhere without wondering who might leave.
I was still afraid.
But I wasn't waiting for Arthur and Evelyn anymore.
I was choosing Elijah.
Click here to continue reading: PART 3: The Cream-Colored House, the Old Subaru, and the Man Who Never Made Me Feel Like I Owed Him My Childhood
The Little Boy Who Believed His Parents Would Return, Even After Everyone Else Had Stopped Waiting
Part 2 of 24
