CHAPTER FORTY NINE

FACING GERARD

"It was during the following week at school that Sula, her little friend, told her that her father had left home and now lived somewhere else. The months went by and Sula always commented to Clara that her mother was very happy and playful. That her mother was becoming more and more different and now it was the father who seemed sadder. She had seen him cry, but didn't understand much of what he and her mother were talking about. And he visited them every evening, tried to hug her mother, perhaps wanting to move back in with them, but her mother smiled and said they were better off this way, and according to Sula, they really seemed better off.

All of this went through Clara's mind. Very quickly, like a sped-up movie, she saw the events of so many years ago and those that followed. Kelly had shown her how to act in cases of abuse, and all the bells in her head went off since Gerard's call. At the bottom of the stairs, her chin trembling with anxiety, she looked into the