School's out, and the first grade exits for the day in double file, with six- year-old Tina somewhere in the middle. Slack-armed, she drifts sideways toward her foster mother across the rushing current of her classmates. Her eyes are scrunched up woefully in the universal expression of a sick child seeking consolation from a parent. Her ear aches, she reports. Also, her feet hurt.
"Ooh, you're in bad shape," Bonnie says, taking the child to her side. "We're going to have to sign you up for Social Security." But her lightness has an edge to it: this may be the day...
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