He Missed the Race, the Ribbon, the Science Olympiad, and Every Birthday, Then Tried to Buy It All Back With a Laptop Left on the Porch — My Son Carried It Back Outside Still Sealed and Said an Expensive Gift Doesn’t Return a Childhood

“Are you going to tell me this was charity too?” I asked.

The color left his face.

“I was going to put it back,” he said.

“Every cent.

Before Ethan started college.” “When?” I said.

“After he took out loans?

While you kept paying for Dylan’s prep school?” “He was never going to go without!” “He went without a father,” I said, and Marcus finally, for the first time in his life, ran out of things to say.

Chapter 13 — The Thief