The person waiting at the tenant office was Harold Ellis, clean and rested after the pantry helped him obtain a temporary room. He had asked the investigators to find Malik because the boy knew when and where the recent water leaks had occurred. Harold was not the owner or a millionaire. The city needed witnesses to establish whether modern maintenance reports matched what residents had observed.
For a few minutes, it seemed the evidence might be too thin to matter. There were memories and dates, but no decisive answer. Malik reminded himself that an uncertain lead was not worthless. It simply should not be presented as proof until someone independent could examine it.
Fear made everyone impatient for an answer, but haste could damage the very evidence they needed.
By evening, Malik had repeated the story enough times to hear where his own account was incomplete. Each repetition made a different detail stand out. He resisted the urge to polish the uncomfortable parts away. The confusion, the hesitation, and the ordinary distractions belonged to the record too. If someone later checked his words, he wanted to recognize the conversation he had actually had.
The people around Malik did not all agree. One advised caution, another demanded action, and a third complained that the entire matter would cost too much time. He listened to them without confusing volume with certainty. Advice came from different kinds of fear. Some people feared the truth; others feared the damage that an unsupported claim might do to the people they were trying to protect.
The neighborhood had a way of carrying on around other people's difficulties. A delivery truck stopped twice at the same curb. Someone argued cheerfully about a ball game near the counter. The traffic light changed even when nobody was waiting to cross. None of those familiar details made the trouble smaller. They only reminded Malik how easily a serious problem could remain invisible to people who had places to be.
The next day required familiar chores. There were dishes to wash, a bus to catch, and bills that did not become less urgent simply because something extraordinary had happened. Malik found a kind of comfort in those tasks. They reminded him that the people involved were not characters waiting for a final revelation. They would have to live with whatever answer arrived.
The uncertainty deserved an honest place in the account.
For the moment, listening was more useful than guessing.
Even so, nothing about the choice felt easy.
Nobody there wanted another careless promise.
Even so, nothing about the choice felt easy.
And he would.
Tasha took Malik's hand and told him he could decline to speak if he felt uncomfortable.