I was back where I’d started.

The woman looked down at me, perplexed. I said the word taxi and pointed to the address on the paper.

She walked me to the street corner and held out her hand until another car stopped. She and the driver exchanged a few words, then she read the address out to him from the paper.

She looked back at me to confirm the address after she read it, then she paid the driver with money from her own pocket. I tried to offer her the money Papa had given me, but she shook her head and said, “No.”

She opened the door and waited for me to get in the car.

I said, “Thank you,” and slipped inside.

She closed the door, and slowly the driver pulled away.

As I looked back, she was still standing on the corner, watching us drive away. The driver took a turn and she disappeared from my sight. I pushed myself back in the backseat, grateful that I had run into her.

The driver was talking to me, but I understood nothing he was saying. He gave up and kept driving.

I soon found myself on a familiar street, on the block where we live. I let out a shriek of recognition when I saw our house. I thanked the driver and ran to our front door.

Manman looked worried when she came to the door with Moy beside her. “Hadn’t school let out long ago?” she asked.

“I was lost,” I said.

Papa was still not home from work.

“We have to talk to Papa about doing this differently,” she said, “so you don’t get lost again.”

LATER

When Papa came home I told him what happened. He said he was sorry he had not made better arrangements for me to get home, but he appeared a little angry and disappointed in me, too.

It wasn’t anything he said, just the way his face looked, tightly drawn and strained. Perhaps we, especially me, were going to be more of a burden to him than he had first thought.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 3

Papa drove me to school and picked me up. He said he would do that every day now, until I felt I could take the bus home by myself. This meant some adjustment in his afternoon work schedule and I felt bad for that.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 4

I still don’t have one person to talk to at school. None of the students have approached me and I am too shy to approach them.

FRIDAY, JANUARY 5

Tonight while I was sitting at the kitchen table, trying to understand my homework, Moy walked over and gave me a gentle tap on the head like he used to in Beau Jour.

“How are you getting along?” he asked.

I told him I was not doing so well. I was having trouble with the lessons and I didn’t have any friends.