Chapter 3The Perfect Children

Later that night, after I had tucked Maya into bed, my husband, Mark, came home from work, looking exhausted.

As we lay in bed, I told him about the day’s events.

He burst out laughing.

“Honey, our daughter just has a wild imagination. You can’t take it so seriously!”

He reasoned, “Kids her age can’t always tell the difference between dreams and reality. She probably had a weird nightmare during her nap and woke up thinking it was real. Besides, there are security cameras everywhere in that school. Who would dare grab a kid in the middle of the day? You’re just scaring yourself.”

His logic was sound. It was like a lightbulb went on. Maya had always loved adventure stories; I’d bought her dozens of fantasy books. Maybe she’d just had a strange dream inspired by one of her stories. In fact, Duke’s mom had come over to return one of those very books.

Finally, I felt the tension in my shoulders release.

Mark pulled me close. “It’s okay. I’ll take her to school tomorrow. I’ll have a little chat with her on the way.”

The next morning, Mark dropped Maya off at preschool. He texted me a few minutes later to say he’d run into Duke’s mom at the gate and they had cleared the air. The two kids had even walked into the classroom together, laughing.

I texted back: 【Thank God for you. I don’t know how long I would have kept spinning my wheels without you.】

With the house clean and some time to spare, I decided to treat myself to a manicure. I had just sat down and was discussing designs with the nail technician when my phone started buzzing nonstop in my purse.

I pulled it out to see a flood of notifications from the parent’s WhatsApp group. In just a few moments, there were over 99 new messages.

My stomach dropped. A cold, heavy sense of dread washed over me.

I opened the chat. The first message I saw was from Duke’s mom.

【My poor boy! My sweet boy is gone! He was so good, so obedient! How could he have killed himself? Someone did this to him! Someone murdered my son!】