I could feel her there, a presence between us, and I understood that the reason we were here had to do with her. She was part of the side of him that lived in shadows—a secret, but not just any secret. One that belonged to Manning, one I wanted to keep for him. “You did this with her?”
“When our parents fought, I’d take Maddy—” He tripped on her name. As he recovered, I tried it out in my head. Maddy. “I’d take her out to the front lawn and make up stories about the constellations. I didn’t know shit, but she started reading books about them.” He swallowed. The emotion in his voice was new for me, and he’d cursed, which he never did in my presence. “Soon enough,” he continued, “she was the one telling me stories.”
“How old was she?”
“Only nine. When she died.”
I audibly sucked in air. I wasn’t sure what I’d expected him to say, but nine just sounded so young. It was the age of the girls in my cabin. I’d been nine seven years ago. Aside from a great aunt, I’d never known anyone who’d died. I couldn’t imagine my life without my sister. My childhood would’ve been completely different without Tiffany, especially if she’d disappeared in the middle of it. Poof. I tried to think of some way to express my sympathy, to make this moment easier on him. I couldn’t touch him, not that I’d know where or how. I’m sorry for your loss just felt like the worst thing I could possibly say.
Maybe talking about her life, instead of death, would help. “Will you tell me about the stars?” I asked.
I could feel his hurt from where I stood. I tugged on his arm and sat right there on the concrete. There was no grass in sight, just this and the pool. It seemed like a big deal for someone his size to sit on the ground, but he did. We both lay back, some distance between us.
“I don’t remember them all.” His voice was hushed. It could’ve been his grief, but I was pretty sure he kept his tone low in case anybody passed by. They wouldn’t know we were here unless they heard us. “It’s been a long time since I looked very hard at the sky,” he said.
I could feel my elbows and shoulder blades on the concrete. I wanted to hear about the stars, but I couldn’t stop trying to picture her. “What did she look like?”
“The opposite of you.”
“You told me once I remind you of her.”
“You do. She was smart and kind. Saw the best in people, always. She’s the only person who loved me as I am.”
Despite the balmy night, I got the chills. Not the only one, I wanted to say. I love you. But the thought of saying that aloud made my heart pound and shriveled my tongue. I wondered if I’d ever be able to admit it. Maybe he knew, though. Maybe that’s how he thought I was like her.
I inched my hand along the warm concrete, toward him.
“She had black hair, like me,” he said. “Dark eyes. We looked a lot alike, except you could tell there was a whole universe behind her eyes.”
Manning could be that way. As if he were living in two different worlds, sometimes only half-present in this one. “How old would she be now?”
“Seventeen. I can’t even picture it.”
I did the math. “You were fifteen?”
“Yes.”
Silence stretched between us. It didn’t seem right to ask how it happened. I wanted him to want me to know, to just tell me. To give me something he hadn’t given anyone else, especially not Tiffany. The longer we stared up at the sky, the more I realized he wouldn’t. And what did that mean? Did he not trust me?
Eventually, he pointed at the sky again. “There it is. I was trying to find the three stars that make up the Summer Triangle.”
I looked for the ones he was talking about. “Where?”
“It’s not a constellation, but three stars from other constellations. That brightest one, it’s the bottom. Altair. About a foot apart is Vega. Through the middle is the Milky Way. You see?”
I still couldn’t find them, but he sounded so hopeful, I didn’t want to ruin it. “I think so.”
“I can’t tell it the way Madison did, but it was her favorite story. There are different versions, but Altair and Vega represent lovers from different sides of a river—or the Milky Way. They married behind their parents’ backs and her father punished them by keeping them apart.”
“With the river?”
“Yes. They were only allowed to be together once a year, the seventh night of the seventh month. The Japanese have a whole festival in July. There was no bridge, so, as long as the night was clear and it wasn’t raining, birds would carry Vega across the river to Altair for that one night.”