6
Jenkins turned around and faced them once again and answered, “You certainly can! As a matter of fact, you can live with Mr. Bennett indefinitely, starting tonight, if you like.” He walked away from them once again and he and Levine got into their police patrol, fastened their seatbelts, pulled out of the parking lot, and sped away silently, without sounding the siren.
Robinson helped Kay get into the passenger‘s seat of his car a few minutes later. “Did you think it would be illegal for you to sleep over at my place?” he said to her and shut the door.
She put the window down and replied, “It might sound crazy, but yes, I did think that staying with you tonight at your house would be illegal.”
“Why?” Robinson said. “You‘re an adult. You stopped being a minor nearly nine years
ago.”
“It‘s just the fact that I haven‘t gotten a good job and I need a guardian in my life, solely for financial support.”
“Solely for financial support,” Robinson repeated. “If you don‘t mind me asking, Kay, why haven‘t you been able to get a job at age twenty-six?”
“My parents always told me that as long as I lived with them, I wouldn‘t need a job.” As Robinson caressed her face, he said, “Forgive me, but they were wrong in telling you
that, and teaching you that. Whether parents or guardians do it in good or bad faith, it‘s wrong for them to use the physical disabilities of the people that they‘re taking care of to hold them back and overprotect them.”
“I don‘t know if you‘re right or wrong in saying that, but I agree with you. Besides, they‘re not here to give me everything that I need anymore.”
“No,” Robinson agreed as he walked around the bumper to go to the driver‘s door, and Kayla put up the window, “they‘re not.” He opened the driver‘s door, got in, closed it, locked all of the doors, fastened his seatbelt, placed the key inside the starter and started the car. “Therefore, you should start thinking about getting a good paying job, just so that you see the day when you won‘t need financial support from anyone.”
They had pulled out of the parking lot already and they were leaving the grocery store. Robinson was just waiting for the cars to stop crossing the road for a few minutes so that he could take a right turn and drive straight home. It was only two fifteen in the afternoon, but Robinson wanted to take Kay home because he knew how tired and depressed she was; so tired and depressed that there was no other place but home that he could take her to cheer her up. Right now, she just wanted to go to bed and take a good nap. Hopefully, that would help her to get over what had just happened to her and Diana.
“Do you have any college education by any chance, Kay?” “I only studied in the University of Miami for three years.” “That‘s not bad. How many credits did you get there?”
“I got enough credits to return to the university and re-enroll any day I want to,” she replied.
“That‘s good,” said Robinson, deeply pleased when he heard this. “Do you think you are ready to re-enroll tomorrow morning?”
Kay turned her face to her left side to look at him. He looked back at her and then faced the road once again. “Robinson, I know that you‘re advising me to do this for my own good, but I need at least thirty days to reunite the pieces of my jigsaw puzzle before I re-enroll.”
“Thirty days?” he said. “What do you need to do within the next thirty days in order to be ready? I‘ll help you get ready. We need to get you back on track as soon as possible.”