“I’m sorry, Valeria,” he whispered. “I didn’t know until it was almost too late.”
“Why did you do it?” I asked. “Why give the principal the folder?”
He looked at his son, who was being led to a separate car by a lawyer. “Because I realized that if I let them destroy you, I would have no son left to love anyway. I would only have a monster.”
He handed me a small, plain envelope. My father stepped forward, defensive.
“It’s not a bribe,” Mr. Rivas said quickly. “It’s a college fund. It’s in the baby’s name. I can’t fix what they did, but I won’t let them be the reason you don’t graduate.”
My father looked at the envelope, then at the broken man in front of him. For the first time in a year, the anger in my father’s eyes softened into something like pity. He took the envelope and nodded once. A silent truce.
