upstairs hal way window they are talking, Dad’s bright hair shining like Tess’s.
At least they’re talking again. They don’t look happy, though.
I wish Tess was here. She’d know how to get Mom and Dad inside. What to say to turn them toward her and away from those last boxes.
I can’t do it, though. I just watch them and wish I could make everything better. I thought I could but now—
Now I’m not so sure.
last night, with Beth and my parents’ reaction to her, and what they said to me, I’m not sure visiting Tess wil do any good.
I don’t think I’m reaching her.
I’m not sure I ever did.
I’m also not sure I should see Eli anymore. I’m starting to get ideas—I’m starting to wish, to want—and I don’t need that.
I figure I’l spend the afternoon watching television, but as I’m walking home, everyone I pass—the mailman shoving an envelope labeled DO NOT
BEND into a mailbox, the woman who used to be the office manager at the plant before she retired and Mom got the job, and two no-longer-little kids Tess used to babysit—ask about her.
They al tel me they’re thinking about her. That they miss her. That nothing’s the same without her smiling face, or “sparkling” eyes, or that she made the best hot chocolate.
I go home, but only to grab money for the ferry. Tess is everywhere and always wil be, so why fight it?
I get to the hospital later than usual, of course. I figure Eli wil be gone, but instead he’s sitting by the bike rack, fingers twitching away on his crossed legs.
“Hey,” I say as I pul up to him. “What are you doing out here?”
“I was waiting inside but I—” He points at his hands. “Bad day, with the tapping and stuff, and there was a little kid waiting to see someone and he kept asking me what I was doing and then copying me and—anyway.”
He careful y stil s his hands, awkwardly forcing them to lie flat. “I also thought—I thought maybe you might not want to see me after I … after I told you al that stuff,” he says.
“I thought about not coming,” I say, and he braces his hands on his knees so hard I can see the tension in them. “But not because of you. I … my parents said some stuff last night about Tess. About how—they say she’l never be the same, that her brain is … she won’t ever be the same.”
“Oh. I’m sorry. Are you—are you al right?” he says, and when he does, al the reminders I’ve chanted to myself, al the things I’ve sworn I won’t forget, they’re gone. Just like that. Just because of him.
“I’m okay,” I manage to say, and try not to watch him as he gets up.
I do, though, and I’m glad he has to walk a little behind me as we go inside the hospital. It gives me a chance to pul myself together. Or at least pretend I have, because then we get on the elevator and it’s crowded and he’s right next to me and he smel s good, like sunshine and laundry detergent and something else, something that’s just him, and I know al about pheromones but never believed in them until now.
Clement gets on at the floor before Tess’s and says, “And how are you today?” to me.
“Al right,” I say, and he glances at Eli. “So, am I al owed to say I’m your grandfather now?”
Eli blushes and folds his arms across his chest. “I never said—” He breaks off, his fingers starting to tap.
Clement looks stricken and then whispers to Eli. I try to pretend I can’t hear what they’re saying but the elevator is smal and Clement isn’t exactly quiet.
“I’m sorry I upset you,” he says. “I know you didn’t say I shouldn’t talk to your father, but I assumed it’s because of how your father talks about me and—”
“It’s fine,” Eli says. “I just—my parents always say I … I don’t want to embarrass you. Okay?”
“Not possible,” Clement says, and Eli mumbles something, then races off the elevator when it stops again, for once not waiting until I go first.
“Sorry,” he says when I catch up to him. “I—I’m stil getting used to the fact that I have a grandfather. Not to mention that I’m living with him.”
“Is it bad?”
“That’s the thing,” Eli says. “He’s … he’s nicer to me than my parents have ever been, and I—I don’t know. It’s strange.”
“Complicated.”
“Yeah,” he says, and smiles at me.
I smile back—I can’t help myself—and start to put in the unit code.
“Hold on,” Eli says.
“What?”
“Look,” he says, pointing, and I do. I see Claire in Tess’s room, moving around, straightening things.
“Oh, it’s just Claire,” I say. “She works here.”
“No, not that. She visits your sister a lot, doesn’t she?”
