I followed her, at a distance, as she walked to a small corner shop across the street, and I watched her stand at the glass case of hot lunch items and stare at them for a few seconds, and reach into her pocket, and count out a few coins, and then put them back, and walk away without buying anything at all.

I had wired two thousand dollars to my mother just four days before.

And my daughter did not have enough coins in her pocket to buy a hot lunch.

Something was very, very wrong, and it was not what my mother had told me.

Chapter 3 — You’re Jason?

I did not go to Maya.

I could not, not yet, because I did not understand what I was seeing, and I was afraid of what I might say before I did.

Instead, I walked straight into the school’s guidance counselor’s office.