An Invisible Thread: The True Story of an 11-Year-Old Panhandler, a Busy Sales Executive, and an Unlikely Meeting with Destiny

Schroff’s gift of a brand-new red bike is an important one to Maurice. It gives him a chance to have something in common with Annette’s kids, who share their bike with Maurice when he comes to visit them in the suburbs. Schroff and Maurice both know he can’t take it back to the welfare motel where he lives, but they assume he can safely ride it around Midtown. However, a teen thug cons Maurice into “lending it” to him for just a quick ride. Maurice is too embarrassed to tell Schroff the truth—that as streetwise as he is, he fell for an obvious scam and had the bike stolen from him. While bicycles are classic childhood staples in the Long Island suburb, they are not items generally afforded the poor children in New York. While Schroff extends a gesture of Maurice’s acceptance into her world—of privilege and safety—the bike does not belong in the dangerous world Maurice is accustomed to. The bike is a symbol of both Schroff and Maurice’s naivete, as well as both of their desires to reconcile their different worlds.