He laughed. “You know you’re in trouble if you start taking my advice.”
“I trust you,” I said. How close to “I love you” was that? Wasn’t it a better thing to tell someone you were very fond of, anyway? There couldn’t be love without trust, could there? That would be just sexual attraction.
Myra talked about putting guineas of affection into a bank account with the name of someone you cared for on it. “Real friendships don’t just happen, love,” she told me once when I was complaining about some of the girls in my class being snobby and unfriendly. “You can invest in people like you invest in stocks and bonds.”
“So you’ll believe me when I tell you I’ll respect you in the morning?” Aaron joked now. Or was he joking?
“Depends on how much you respect me at night,” I countered.
He laughed and was silent a moment, so long a moment that I thought we had been disconnected.
“Hello?”
“You know, I started to watch you when you were in ninth grade. There was something I saw that told me you were going to be special, and then you just bloomed like a rose overnight.”
“Are you reading from some book called How to Win the Heart of a Girl?”
“Honest. You can ask Skip or Brad or even Paulie.”
“If you were caught robbing a bank, they would testify that you were in their houses at the time.”
He laughed again. “Okay. I’ll just have to find a way to prove it.”
“Do that. I gotta go. I want to help set the table tonight. See you tomorrow.”
“Ah, the coming out of the Lady of Shalott,” he said. “I’d better get prepared.”
I felt so excited and happy. It was like I was intoxicated on hope again. I practically bounced out of my room and then paused at Willie’s door to look in. The boy was awake. He was sitting up and slowly turning the pages of one of Willie’s picture books of fables. The one he was reading was “How the Beggar Boy Turned into Count Piro.” I knew it well, having read it aloud to Willie from time to time. It was one of his favorites. It told the story of a clever fox that helped a poor boy marry a princess and become rich.
“Do you like that story?” I asked now. The boy was so engrossed in it that he hadn’t heard me enter the room. He looked up quickly. “Do you think you’re like the Beggar Boy?”
He looked down at the book and then at me again. He didn’t answer, but there was no doubt in my mind that living here—with my grandfather laying on gifts and all the servants waiting on him—made him feel like a prince. I shouldn’t blame him for it, I thought.
“It’s better when you hear someone read it to you,” I said, and plucked it out of his hands. Then I sat on the bed and began. “Once upon a time, there lived a man who had only one son, a lazy, stupid boy, who would never do anything he was told . . .”
As I read, I kept an eye on him to see if anything I was reading was having a personal effect on him. He blinked a lot, but he didn’t smile or look sad. He looked more like Willie had when I read it to him, his eyes widening with amazement at some of the magic in the story.
I was so into it myself that I didn’t hear Dorian step up behind me at the foot of the bed. After a few moments, I sensed her presence and paused to look at her. She smiled, turned, and walked out. The boy stared at me, anxious for me to continue. I read to the end of the story and closed the book.
“That was one of my brother’s favorite fables,” I said. He nodded as if he had known. “Would you like me to read you another one sometime?”
This time, he smiled and nodded.
“Someone used to read to you, too, right?”
He blinked rapidly and then looked like he might cry or scream, so I got up quickly.
“I’m not going to call you William,” I said. “That’s not your name, and you know it’s not. It’s my brother’s name.” I looked at the fable I had just read to him. “I’m going to call you Count Piro.”
I thought he was smiling, although it wasn’t easy to tell. He also looked like he was about to cry.
“I’m going down to help with dinner,” I said, rising. “Are you getting hungry?”
He nodded.
I had an idea. “When you get better, do you want to go back to where you were?” I asked him.
His eyes widened, and he shook his head.