Isaiah chewed his lip. "Are you mad at him?"
Naomi exhaled. "I am finished building rooms in my life for his absences to live in. That is not the same as mad. It is quieter. And it leaves more space for you."
Malik sent a check anyway. Naomi put it into Isaiah's lesson fund and texted a receipt. She did not invite further conversation. Some doors, once closed, could be acknowledged without being reopened.
September at Northside brought new friends who did not know the podium story unless Isaiah chose to tell them. He told Priya after a month, in a practice room the size of a closet, because secrets made his embouchure tight. Priya listened and said, "That's messed up," with a flat sincerity that felt better than pity. She did not treat him as breakable. She competed with him for chair placements and grinned when she won and grinned when he did. Competition without cruelty was a revelation. Isaiah started staying after school for ensemble, then for jazz band, then for the foolish joy of trying a bass clarinet that made him sound like a friendly monster.
Naomi timed her night classes around his rehearsals when she could. When she could not, Ruth or Jordan or, once, Marta picked him up. The village was imperfect and real. On Sundays, Naomi cooked with the radio on and let Isaiah choose the station. Sometimes he chose silence. Silence, shared, was also music.
The apology letter from the district arrived on a Tuesday. Naomi opened it at the kitchen table while Isaiah did homework. She read it aloud because hiding it would have made it larger. Isaiah listened, pencil hovering.