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me back my ball?   I’m really sorry.   My dad will be really mad at me if I don’t bring his ball back.   It’s special.   We caught it.   It’s a fly ball, not a regular one.”
    She jumps to the side, dropping the curtains and pressing her back against the wall next to the window.   She’s breathing heavily, panicking like a trapped animal.
    He taps on the window.   “I saw you in there.   Are you hiding?   Please can I have my ball?”
    Realizing that he’s not going to go away until the ball is back in his hands, she tiptoes over to the coffee table and bends over to get it. The pain is so sudden, it causes her to breathe in sharply.   She stands upright again, immediately giving up on the idea of picking up the ball. From where she’s standing, the boy’s shadowed form is visible through the curtains.   He’s pressing his face up to the glass.   She can hear him as clear as if he’s standing right there in the room next to her, his voice coming through the broken pane.
    “I’m really sorry.   I’ll pay you for the window.   I have money in my piggy bank at home.   Just don’t tell my dad, okay?   He’ll be so mad at me.”
    Nicole swallows the tears that are coming.   The idea that this boy might suffer at the hands of a man like she does is too much to bear.   Not a child.   Children could never do anything that wrong.
    She moves closer to the ball and kicks it backwards, out from behind the table.   Step by step, she uses her toes to maneuver it towards the front door.   She can’t bend over to pick it up, but she can kick the thing to the door.   It’s one of those rare occasions when it’s not locked.   John must have been in a hurry when he left.   Giving this boy his ball back is the least she can do to ensure his safety.   If she had a phone she’d even call the police for him.
    The boy leaves the window and goes to the front door again, knocking once more.   “Are you giving me my ball back?   Are you in there?”
    Nicole gets the ball onto the tile floor.   It rolls this way and that, not cooperating with her plan to get it to the boy very well.   “I’m coming,” she says, her voice very rusty and almost unintelligible.   “I’m coming,” she says again, her eye on the door.   He finally stops knocking.
    She reaches the front door and stops, her hand hovering near the latch.   The fear of touching it is almost enough to make her turn away and go back to the couch.   Or maybe the kitchen where the little boy won’t be able to see her shadow through any curtains.   But she pushes through the pain, the thought of him being in trouble too urgent to ignore.
    The latch moves slowly out of its catch as the handle mechanism turns.   She opens the door a crack, just far enough to look through the space with one eye.
    The little boy doesn’t even wait for her to speak.   “Thank you very much.   I’m sorry about the window.   I was trying to hit a fly ball and I messed up.   It went really far but the wrong way.   The really wrong way.”
    “Don’t worry about it,” she says, pushing the ball to the door with her toes.   It’s almost to the crack.
    “Why are you whispering?” the boy asks.   He drops the volume of his voice to match hers.   “Is someone asleep in there?”
    “No. It’s just me.”   The ball is against the crack in the door but it won’t go through.   It’s too big.
    “Are you okay?   Your voice sounds funny.”
    “I’m fine. Here’s your ball.”   She opens the door just a bit more, intending to kick the ball through it.   But the edge of the door pushes the ball away and it rolls back.
    The boy must have seen it because he bends down and reaches in to go after it, his shoulder hitting the door and pushing it in farther.
    Nicole wasn’t expecting the handle to come towards her, so she’s totally unprepared for it to bang into her sore ribs.   Gasping with the pain, she backs up two steps and the door swings