Chapter 79

“I have a question,” I said.

“What?” George said.

“You’ve had Robbie for a couple of years, so why are you getting worried now?”

“Actually,” George said, “this has always been a sort of nagging concern all along, but until now it was on the back burner.”

“Until we watched that movie last week,” Mike said.

“Movie?” I said.

“One of those tearjerker made-for-TV movies,” George said, “about adoptive parents who raised their adopted kid for years, only to have a blood relative pop up out of the woodwork and take the kid away from them.”

“Surely that doesn’t happen in real life,” I said.

“Damn thing was supposedly based on a true story,” Mike said.

Another quick mental probe revealed that these two self-assured men had in fact been deeply affected by the film.

“Okay, then,” I said. “I’ll do it. Probably when Nate has spring break—I’ll have to wait until he gets home to find out just when that is. No, belay that. Give me a minute, and I’ll look it up on the UNF website.”