“Don’t bury her—that’s not her in the coffin!” a little girl cries out at a Chicago funeral, stopping everything as a shocking truth inside the coffin is revealed

alley where Caroline’s eyes had begged for help. She thought of Vivian’s poison, Rosa’s trembling hands, Lily’s tiny fingers.

Then she thought of the little boy at the foundation, eating soup as though he could not believe it would not be taken from him.

Ava understood something then.

Kindness did not erase darkness.

But it gave someone a reason to walk continue reading …