“So?”
He shakes his head. “It’s that easy for you.” It’s not a question this time.
“She’s our sister. Of course it is.”
He smiles ruefully. “Yeah. You—even after all this time, you still surprise me.”
I squint at him. “What did you think we’d do? Put her out on the streets?”
He shakes his head. “’Course not. But you never thought of anything else. She was always going to stay here.”
“She’s our family,” I tell him. “She’s ours now.”
“You have no idea, do you?” Dom says.
“No.” Otter’s smiling at me. I think I’m missing something. “He doesn’t. It’s one of those things. It’s always been like that.”
I roll my eyes. “If you’re done speaking in code, we have shit to do.”
They both laugh at me.
THREE DAYS later, Otter and I are an hour outside Coeur D’Alene, Idaho. My window’s rolled down, and my arm is outside the window, hand moving up and down with the wind. Izzie’s staying with Ty and Dom while we’re gone. She didn’t want to come. I only asked her once. Ty was the same.
“I’ll stay here,” he told me, averting his eyes. “Someone needs to keep an eye on her.”
“Sure, Kid,” I’d responded easily. “If that’s what you want.”
“Unless, you think—do you need me to go? With you?”
“Nah. I’ve got Otter. And it’s better for her. I think. If you’re still here.”
“You okay?” Otte
r asks me now, hand firm on my thigh.
“Yeah,” I tell him, because I don’t know what else to say.
PEOPLE SAY that they have memories of when they were two or three years old. I don’t know if I believe that. I think they want so hard to remember—that stories they’re told somehow become ingrained into them as their own—that they convince themselves it’s not a story they’re remembering but an actual memory.
There are bits and pieces buried deep in my mind. Hazy flashes that are nothing but fuzz where I’m little and she’s there, and she’s saying Knock it off, Derrick, or You’re gonna hurt yourself if you don’t get off that chair.
It’s clear, though, when I was four. Maybe five.
There were stretches of days when she didn’t have a glass in her hand, the amber liquid swishing around, ice clinking together. Days when her eyes were a little brighter and she’d laugh a little louder. Days when she would put her hand on the back of my neck and squeeze, and I’d grin at her through a mouthful of Pop-Tarts, something I rarely got to have.
It was then that I could remember her with a startling clarity. It wasn’t haze. It wasn’t muted. And if I push, it’s the first thing I can remember.
She said, “The rain has stopped. I’m glad. I don’t like it when it rains for days and days.”
I was eating that Pop-Tart, trying not to inhale it, because I didn’t know when we’d get more, as this was the last one. The TV was on, and the screen was a little fuzzy because the rabbit ears were broken. There were cartoons on. I’m sure of that.
“Why don’t we go outside?” she asked me.
“Okay,” I said, spraying crumbs onto my lap.
“Okay,” she said.
We did, later. And we’d walked hand in hand, and I was jumping in the puddles, and gasping dramatically at all the worms on the sidewalk, and pointing out everything I could show her. And even though I was young, even though I can’t remember much after that, I knew even then that this was important. Because this was different. She was here—really here—with me. And even though I didn’t know it then, it was the most I’d ever get from her. It felt complete. I couldn’t put a word to it, I couldn’t understand this little light that was burning in my chest, but it felt good. Her hand was in mine and it felt good.