“Bubbles?”

"They'll make the water a little soapier, but a lot more fun!"

Eric nods. This lady hasn’t steered him wrong so far.

She shakes some liquid under the tap, from a decently sized glass bottle. It smells pretty strongly of some kind of flower or fruit, and the water rapidly fills up with thick foam.

Eric is very much in awe. It looks like the foamy bits in waves, but smells like flowers! Is this woman a witch? He pulls himself up over the rim of the tub to sniff the bubbles, getting some on his nose.

She caps the bottle. "Oh, isn't it nice? We make it at home, castile soap and coconut oil and some essential oils and a little aloe - Zanna's allergic to the stuff you get at the supermarket. Gives her the worst rashes. Okay, here's how I'll do it -"

She picks him up and plunks him down in the soapy water, draping his ankle over the side of the tub, with a loofah under it for padding. "We'll want to ice your ankle when we can, so warm water won't do it any favors. But we can get the rest of you nice and clean, and I can wash your foot with some cold water after."

Eric’s main answer is to shudder with pleasure, but he does manage a nod. He giggles at the bubbles popping against his skin.

And the woman sets to scrubbing.

"Where'd your clothes get to in the first place?" she asks, washing his back.

“Clothes? Oh, I don’t wear ‘em.”

"...huh. I bet your parents don't wear clothes either, right?"

Eric shakes his head. “Nope!” He tilts his neck in thought. “Well, my mommy doesn’t. Daddy probably did.”

"Okay."

There's that nudist colony about ten miles west, and that means she's got a pretty good idea where Eric came from. That does not mean she's happy. She's got nothing against people living like that, even if it drives property values down, but this kid's roaming on his own, miles from home, he doesn't have shoes, he broke into her house somehow and sprained his ankle and ?got covered in soup? and hid under a table about it, he was terrified to be found by an adult. She's frankly surprised he's as upfront as he is about having parents; she was expecting him to have run away, to need a lot more coaxing to give her any information at all.

(She was ready to do it. She's going to bring the wrath of God down on these people.)

"I never introduced myself, did I? I'm Ellen Richardson. What's your mommy's name?"

“I’m Eric. My mommy’s name is Belinda.”

"Belinda! That's really pretty. Is your last name that pretty too?"

“Don’t have one of those.”

"...huh! Like Cher."

That's inconvenient. But the first name's uncommon enough, and the community small enough, that she'd be shocked if it were ambiguous once the cops look into it.

(There's a little twinge of guilt about calling the cops on somebody, like that's ever made anything better - no, stop. She's not in Harlem anymore. These are suburban cops. They've probably forgotten how their guns work, they're not going to shoot anybody.)

She looks at the water and clicks her tongue. "I might have to run us another bath before too long, you're really putting this one through its paces. At least the soup's off of you and we can focus on normal dirt."

“Cher?”

"She's a famous singer! And that's her whole name, she doesn't have a last name either."

Ellen starts singing If I Could Turn Back Time.

Eric starts splashing in time to the song. Good sense of rhythm, this boy. 

Ellen pauses after the second chorus. "I'm gonna rinse your hair before we change the water, just so we can get you properly clean with the second round instead of just making mud soup again. I need you to close your eyes, though, okay? It's gentle shampoo but it still might sting your eyes if it gets in."

Eric squeezes his eyes shut.

Something that feels like cold honey drips into his matted hair, and then Ellen's fingers are working through it, gently tugging and untangling and grooming in ways that seem like they shouldn't be allowed to feel that nice.

There’s a fair bit of hair to work with. It’s shaggy for a little boy.

Ellen has a (lapsed) cosmetology and hairstyling license. This is within her skillset.

God damn this kid's hair is in a bad way. Has he been running through the forest Tom Sawyer-style.