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Luckily, it doesn’t appear to be malware.

It’s a report from a nearby emergency department, dated July 2017. The patient is Kamden Blake, age ten.

There are photos of bruises—purple crescents blooming across thin wrists and biceps. His face is swollen almost beyond recognition, with a jagged laceration at his temple stitched with coarse sutures, a splinted wrist angled wrong, crushed fingernails, and notes about a broken rib. The official history reads “fell down stairs.”

I scroll further to view the nurse’s report. “Injury pattern inconsistent with reported mechanism. Social work consulted. Adult male present at residence identified as mother’s boyfriend. Child initially stated he fell, later became distressed when questioned alone. Would not elaborate. CPS referral. Mother provided video of child’s fall to authorities. No removal. Warning given.”

The cloth in my right hand tears where I’m gripping it too hard. I release it, and it flutters to the floor.

Ten.

He was ten.

Two years after John died.

Two years after I promised.

My chest tightens, a knot of guilt and rage crushing every breath. I slam my phone down on the counter, sweat beading at my hairline.

I’m supposed to believe Sherry just so happened to have a video of Kamden falling down the stairs? And what stairs? They can’t mean the fucking concrete ones leading to the unit above theirs. Right? Because what the fuck? How the hell did CPS accept that? There’s no fucking way.

He gave me his son.

John gave me his fucking son, and I did nothing.

I checked on the child once—one fucking time—and decided alive meant fine because the alternative required something from me that I wasn’t capable of giving.

Maybe I truly wasn’t capable then.

Maybe taking a nine-year-old while drinking too much, sleeping too little, learning how to use a prosthetic, and barely controlling my own anger would have made everything worse.

That part may be true.

But ten?

Eleven?

Twelve?

At what age did the excuse stop being temporary and become cowardice?

I could have looked again, but I didn’t.

I told myself Kamden had a mother.

I told myself children survive imperfect parents every day.

I told myself John had been afraid because divorce makes people imagine the worst in each other.

I told myself it would be fine. That he was fine.

But he wasn’t. And this is the evidence. Ten years old, with more bruises than a pro fighter after a loss.

A weak person would have broken years ago.

Kamden didn’t.

He adapted.