He told the judge he wasn’t asking anyone to pretend he was ready.
He was asking for the chance to prove he could become ready before the children were forced to pay for the court’s caution.
That distinction mattered to him.
He wasn’t asking the court to gamble with the children because of what had happened to him decades earlier.
He was asking the adults in the room to consider whether separating the siblings should really be the first solution rather than the last one.
Across the room, the five children still sat together.
The youngest leaned against one of the older siblings.
The little girl who had been crying stayed close to her brother.
And the oldest boy kept watching Carter.
For most of the hearing, adults had spoken around the children.
They had discussed placements, transportation, resources, responsibility, and risk.
They had talked about what Carter could or couldn’t handle.
They had talked about what the system could arrange.
Then the six-year-old stood up.
The movement was small enough that Carter almost missed it.
The boy kept one hand wrapped around his sister’s fingers.
He looked at Carter with the cautious seriousness of a child trying to understand the rules before trusting an adult.
The question he asked was not about money.
It wasn’t about the size of Carter’s home.
It wasn’t about bedrooms, paperwork, or whether Carter was married.
It went straight to the fear underneath everything that had happened that morning.
“If one of us is bad,” the boy asked, “will you send just that one away?”
Carter had spent weeks preparing to answer adults.
He had prepared to explain his finances.
He had prepared to defend his living arrangements.
He had prepared to be called unrealistic.
