That is how fast a lie can travel now.
Faster than truth.
Faster than gratitude.
Faster than a frightened old bus driver can explain what really happened.
I found out at 6:12 the next morning, sitting in my kitchen with a heating pad on my knees and burnt toast on my plate.
My daughter, Mara, called before my coffee was even finished.
“Mom,” she said, “please tell me this isn’t your route.”
I could hear that tone in her voice.
The tone adult children use when they are trying not to panic their aging parents.
“What isn’t my route?”
She sent me the screenshot.
There was Silas.
Big as a doorway.
Standing on Kinsley’s lawn in his orange vest, arms crossed, beard tangled from the cold wind, boots planted in the grass.
The photo had been taken from across the street.
No context.
No black sedan.
No frightened bus driver.
