Millbrook's superintendent, a man named Walter Price with a politician's handshake and a pastor's voice, requested a meeting. Present were Price, Kellerman, a district attorney whose job was risk, and Naomi with Marta beside her as counsel-friend. Isaiah stayed with Ruth. The offer was tidy: Briggs would retire at the end of the school year with benefits intact; the district would revise its physical intervention policy; Isaiah would receive a written apology that admitted "inappropriate physical contact" without admitting liability; the family would sign a nondisclosure agreement and withdraw the OCR complaint; a modest educational stipend would be provided for private music lessons.
Marta's pen tapped. Naomi stared at the word modest until it looked like a joke.
"You want my silence," she said.
"We want resolution," Price said. "For Isaiah's sake. Prolonged conflict is not healthy for a child."
"Prolonged indifference wasn't either," Naomi said.
They went back and forth for an hour. The stipend number rose. The apology language softened and then hardened again under Marta's pencil. Naomi asked for Briggs to be barred from volunteering or guest-conducting in the district. Price hesitated, then agreed in principle. Naomi asked for the NDA to die. Price said that was difficult. Marta said difficulty was not impossibility.