“Grace, I’m scared.”
I turn around. I know this fear as though it were on my own face.
“What are we supposed to do?” She places her hands on her stomach. “Who am I to think I can be a mother?”
“What happened, Hannah?”
“I can’t give her the life she should have.”
“You have to think about what’s best for your life, too, Hannah.”
“My life, Grace?”
“Yes. Yours. We all have choices. Things might seem crazy and impossible.” I can feel Will’s hands on my shoulder as we watched the train pass. “But it doesn’t have to be that way,” I say. “Maybe more things are possible than we realize.”
Hannah gazes down at her hands cradling the slight bulge pushing forward. The microwave beeps, startling me. “Come on. You look like you could use some meat loaf. It’s from the diner.” I reach into the microwave and take out the cardboard container, set it down on the counter.
“What is that?” Hannah points at the brown bottle next to the cup of coffee.
I glance over at the potassium cyanide. “That’s a choice that I thought I had to make.” Reaching up into the cabinet, I take out a plate and begin to transfer the meat loaf from the container.
“It’s not a choice.” Dad walks into the kitchen past Hannah and moves over to the sink. He crosses his arms.
“She can make her own decisions,” Hannah says.
I look up from the plate and glance over at Dad. In the reflection of the window above the sink, I find myself standing alone in the kitchen. A faint whistle echoes in the distance. Hannah heard Dad. One knee buckles, and I shift my eyes between them. Hannah heard Dad. My breath catches in my throat. This is not possible. Hannah and Dad watch each other. A high-pitched noise, the grinding of metal on metal, worms into my ears. No, no, no. The train is real. I saw it today. It’s real. It is real.
“Grace.” Dad steps over to me. “Grace, I know you can do this. Push back against the sounds. They are not real.”
Hannah takes one step into the kitchen. “Are you real?”
Dad points at Hannah. “STOP!”
“I won’t let you do this to her,” Hannah says.
“I’m trying to save her, just like I tried to save you.” Dad pleads, “Please, please give her a chance.”
“You didn’t save me!” Hannah shouts.
“I TRIED!” Dad yells back.
There is a faint trembling rising up from my feet. A clear, sharp whistle pierces lightly, then disappears. I reach over and grip the brown bottle. “LEAVE ME ALONE!” I scream.
“Grace, this isn’t you,” Dad begs.
“Dad, what’s going on?”
Hannah takes another step into the kitchen. “She knows what’s coming for her. She can make her own choice to stop it.”
I stare at her face. The gentle bow of her upper lip. The pink labyrinth swirls of her ears. The blade line of her jaw. This face I know in my heart before I can remember her name. I know how she likes to blow her bangs off her forehead when she is tired. How her eyes squint crescent moons when she laughs. Her voice reading to me at night. I have missed her so much. My mother. She came back for me when I needed her the most. Standing beside me, my mother and father, as it was always supposed to be, and yet I do not gaze up into the reflection of us in the window above the sink. For I know from the outside what a stranger would see passing by this house alone in its field of forget-me-nots.
“No, no, no.” Dad shakes his head, his voice trembling. “Hannah, you must leave her alone. She has a chance to get better.”
“Don’t you get it?” Hannah says, taking another step forward. “You want her to rot in some hospital waiting for a miracle. Do you really want her to live scared and drugged out of her mind? That’s the kind of life you want for our daughter?”
Dad holds out his hands. “Grace, listen to me. Please. Concentrate on my words. Block out everything else. Listen to me, Grace. Things can change. There are new developments all the time. You have to have faith.”
A sudden vibration almost sways me off balance. A growing thunder thrums in my ears. The clatter of tracks rattles hard against my heart. There is no more time. The train was not real. I cannot trust myself. I have to do this quickly before I fall. My hands are shaking so hard I can barely get the lid off the coffee cup. Half of it spills on the counter. I twist open the cap of the bottle and start to pour the white crystalline grains into the coffee.
“NO, GRACE!” Dad shouts in my ears, and I drop the bottle on the floor. The white crystals spill everywhere. Dad’s voice clings to me. “I know I wasn’t there for you in all the ways you needed. I was doing my best for us as a family. But it was always all for you. I love you, Grace. Please don’t do this.”
“You left me,” I cry. “You were never around for me. You were always trying to find her . . . find a cure for her!” I point at Hannah.
“No, bugaboo. There was such little time left after we moved here. I had to do everything in my power to help you before the illness got worse. Bug, I was doing it all for you. You. You are my life.”
I see his face so clearly. Drop by drop, all the sadness of what has never been said, the words trail down the worn grooves of his face. Those horizon-blue eyes begging me to stay with him. He fought
