Matty sat in the second row by the window, his yellow pencil lined up perfectly with the edge of his notebook.

Mrs.

Thorne laid the blue sheet face down on Matty’s desk and patted his shoulder twice before moving on down the aisle.

Matty flipped the paper over.

Along the top line, where he’d written his mother’s name and job in dark pencil, a thick red question mark circled the words Navy SEAL.

Next to it, in stiff block letters, someone had stamped one word: UNVERIFIED.

Matty pulled up the hem of his blue striped cotton shirt and started wiping his round plastic wire-rimmed glasses.