"I told her you'd gone away for a while." He sinks his hands into his pockets, watching David steadily. "There wasn't much else I could tell her, since there wasn't anything else I knew."

Certainly he'd had his guesses, of course; he'd been one who'd assumed that David had been killed. But that wasn't something you told a twelve year old. Or a thirteen year old.

"She's a teenager now, you know." God help them.