She turned me to face the mirror and my heart stalled. The girl standing in front of me was the same girl who had walked away from Cade and Destiny twelve years earlier. Oh sure, she was slightly older, and hopefully a hell of a lot smarter, but other than that, not much had changed.
I frowned at my reflection. I didn’t know what startled me the most.
How these clothes still fit me after all these years.
Or how good it felt to be wearing them again.
Confusion knotted in my chest.
I needed to clear my head. Get my emotions straight.
I needed to see my brother.
Talking to him always helped.
I needed some brother-sister time.
An hour later, I walked through the immaculate green lawns of Grenville Park, our local cemetery. It had been twelve years, but not a lot had changed and I had no trouble finding Bolt’s grave. He was next to our grandparents, Connie and Jude Parrish, and our Uncle Samuel who’d died at nine years old from acute leukemia.
On Sunday, my daddy would join them in the shade of the willow tree.
I walked toward Bolt’s grave and immediately felt an all-too-familiar feeling of pain and regret spread through my chest. I used to visit every week, but hadn’t been back since leaving for college.
I knelt before his gravestone and drew in a deep breath, exhaling slowly as I let the feelings of grief and loss engulf me. Bolt had died young. One minute he was here, and the next minute he was gone.
And I was alone.
I reached out and traced his name carved into the fieldstone.
BOLT HANK PARRISH
Sadness wrapped itself around my heart. It had been eighteen years since I had seen my brother. Eighteen years since I’d heard his voice and his infectious laugh. Eighteen years since he had put his arm around my shoulders and told me everything was going to be okay.
My heart ached. Tears spilled down my cheeks.
My brother.
I had left him behind, too.
INDY—Aged 12
Then
I hated the smell of the hospital. Mama said I would get used to it, but I didn’t think I would, not even if I worked there every single day. And why anyone would want to work where it smelled so bad and people were so unhappy was beyond me. The only good thing about the hospital was getting to hang out with Bolt and watching TV while eating Jell-O and ice cream. The nurses were kind and gentle, and they would bring me little tubs of it when they brought Bolt’s dinner to his room. And half the time, Bolt didn’t feel like eating, so I got to eat his, as well. Lately, Bolt hadn’t been eating at all, so they had him hooked up to a bag that fed something into his arm, but the nurses still brought dessert for me.
Bolt got tired a lot. Even watching TV was tiresome for him, so he’d ask me to read to him instead. He loved Harry Potter and we were half-way through book three. I liked reading out loud to him because he would close his eyes and his face would look peaceful, and I wondered if me reading to him was the only time he was able to block out the pain. It made me feel helpful, which was good, because watching his illness eat him from the inside out and not being able to do anything made me cry into my pillow every single night.
Not that I let Mama know. Or Daddy—especially not Daddy, because he had become so stressed and mean lately. He didn’t smile anymore, and there was a harsh edge to his voice, so I stayed away from him. One night, I found him sitting in the treehouse with his legs dangling over the side. He had a bottle of liquor in one hand and his face was buried in the other. He was sobbing and it made me feel real weird because I had never seen my daddy cry before, but this night he was really letting his tears get the better of him. I watched him sob, then take a swig of liquor, and then sob again.
He didn’t really come to the hospital very much anymore, either. But today he did, although him being there didn’t seem to comfort my mama much. She was crying a lot, more than usual. Ronnie, Garrett, and Cade were there, too, and even they looked torn up and scared, and I didn’t understand why. They’d seen Bolt lots of times, but for some reason today they were taking it real bad. I went to the water fountain for a drink, and when I walked back to Bolt’s room, Garrett Calley brushed past me muttering, “It ain’t right, God taking them so damn young.”
Alarmed and confused, I watched him disappear down the hallway and out of view. When I turned back toward Bolt’s room, Ronnie and Cade were walking out.