“Dahlia?” Marisa said. “Honey, are you okay?”
My vision was blurry.
“Are you hurt?” she said.
She sounded as though she was a long way down a tunnel. Down in a black hole. Both of us.
I was cold and sweating at the same time, and my heart wasracing. I couldn’t catch my breath. The ceiling in this space was low.
“Yeah,” Marisa said as though we’d piled into this inter-closet casket to catch up, shoot the breeze. “I sure was Winnie-the-Pooh stuck in that hole, wasn’t I? Remember that story?”
I couldn’t fill my lungs to answer. I managed to shake my head at her.
Shut up, shut up.
Couldn’t she see I couldn’t—
I can’t—
Was I dying?
I didn’t want to die.
“Of course you do,” Marisa said. “Remember the library? No, probably not. You were so little. We’d go to the library every week, Tuesday mornings songs and story times with the other kids. And then I would read you whatever you found on the shelves. Sometimes we’d sit there for hours. Itsy-bitsy spider, Old MacDonald. You could doallyour animal noises.”
In the dark of the scuttle space, I couldn’t see her well enough to know if she was making a joke.
A library? For hours?
I was reminded of the photo on her dresser, mother and cherished child. And then the little pink cast on my arm when I’d come to stay with Alex. She couldn’t wipe that all away, make me forget the damage she’d caused with a story about Old MacDonald’s freaking farm.
“You,” I said, my voice choked. I licked my lips, concentrated on finding my breath.
“And you,” Marisa said. “They had this little record player and we listened to ‘You Are My Sunshine’ until I thought the children’s librarian would kick us out.” She changed to a lilting singsong and tried a few lines.
I looked up.
“Oh, you thought you developed your love of old-time music spontaneously?” Marisa said. “No, that was sitting inmylap, oh my darlin.’ Try humming.”
I tried. I couldn’t. And then I could.
I’d stopped shaking, at least. My back still ached, but in a dull way. I had found my breath, and my pulse had stopped thumping in my throat and ears. “You sure?” I said. “That it wasn’t Sicily you sang to?”
“I sang to her, too… I…” She sucked in a breath. “Did you say…” Her voice twisted away.
Sicily, who might be on her way to the pub. Who hadn’t seen her mother in four days, had imagined the worst.
Marisa wiped at her face, smearing dirt and grime. “You know Sicily?”
“I know her well enough,” I said, “to know she’ll want to see you.”
Marisa cried into her hands. Her fingernails were filthy.
“Oh, and that she might be failing out of college.”
“But how—” Her waterworks sniffled to a stop. “She’s not flunking out. Is she? How do you know?”
“That was called ripping off the bandage, Marisa,” I said. “You two can talk about it later. Soon. Let’s go.”
