A nurse examined Ethan’s arm, then a doctor ordered imaging.
I stood beside the bed while Ethan tried to be brave.
Every time someone touched his arm, his face tightened.
He didn’t scream.
That scared me more.
Four-year-olds are supposed to complain about bandages and thermometers.
They aren’t supposed to study adults’ faces before deciding whether it is safe to make noise.
A police officer arrived while we waited for the scan results.
He introduced himself, then asked to speak with me outside the room.
I hesitated.
Ethan reached for the nurse’s hand.
“I’ll stay with him,” she said.
I stepped into the hallway.
The officer opened a small notebook.
“Your son made a spontaneous statement when we entered the apartment,” he said.
“We didn’t ask him leading questions.
He told us the same basic thing he told you.”
My stomach tightened.
“What exactly did he say?”
The officer paused.
“He said the boyfriend got angry.
He said the man picked up the bat and hit his arm.”
I looked through the glass panel in the door.
Ethan was staring at a cartoon playing silently on a wall-mounted television.
“He’s four.”
“I know.”
“Did the man admit it?”
“No.
He says Ethan fell while playing and struck his arm against furniture.”
“Then why was the bat in an evidence bag?”
“Because your son identified it, and because of where officers found it.”
“Where?”
The officer looked at his notes.
“On the floor near the couch, several feet from the child.”
The boyfriend’s story, he explained, had already changed twice.
First Ethan had fallen.
Then Ethan had supposedly been swinging the bat himself.
Then the boyfriend claimed he had taken the bat away and Ethan hurt himself during a tantrum.
Three explanations in less than half an hour.
“And there’s something else,” the officer said.
I remembered the sentence outside the apartment.
That’s not the only thing the kid told us.
“What?”
“When officers arrived, your son was behind the couch.
He told them he had hidden there after making the phone call.”
I closed my eyes.
The entire drive from downtown I had imagined Ethan trapped somewhere, waiting for me.
I hadn’t imagined him hiding silently behind furniture while an angry adult searched for the phone.
The officer continued.
“The suspect told us he didn’t know Ethan had called anyone.”
“But I heard him.”
“What did you hear?”
I repeated the exact words.
Who are you talking to?
The officer wrote them down.
“And the call disconnected immediately afterward?”
