# THOMPSON-HAYES: BLOOD MONEY
## Chapter Thirty-Nine — Lila's Sentencing
She did not go to the courthouse.
The sentencing was on a Friday at two in the afternoon. Mia was in her classroom at Riverside Charter Academy grading revised drafts from period two and she was where she had decided she would be. She had made this decision three weeks ago when Patricia told her the sentencing date. She had sat with it for two days and then told Patricia: I'm not going.
Patricia had said: *That's the right call.*
She had not asked why. She did not need to. She had known Mia long enough to understand that some rooms required your presence and some rooms required your absence, and the specific wisdom was knowing which was which.
She was grading Marcus Webb's final draft of the spoken word piece. H
