Prologue
TRIPP
6 years old
I’ve crawled under my blankets to hide with my comic book and my flashlight until my parents fall asleep; but I can’t stop thinking about what they told us all at dinner tonight.
‘We’ve decided to try to have another baby.’
I don’t want a new baby.
My mom tells me that I’m just not happy because it meansIwouldn’t be the baby anymore, but that’s not true.
They said that when there’s a new baby, we have to start calling them Mother and Father again, like we used to when our family was all whole. My Uncle Patrick says change is a good thing, and that new babies are a blessing from God, but this doesn’t feel like a blessing.
When I think about it, my heart beats too fast and it makes my tummy hurt.
Pulling my blanket off of my head, I tiptoe to the door of my bedroom and crack it open, looking down the hallway toward my parents’ room. The light under their door is dark now, so I run back toward my bed to get my blanket and my favorite pillow.
It’s time for my secret mission.
Special operative, Tripp Montgomery, is on the case.
I don’t like this hallway at night. It’s long and dark and there are too many pictures of Jesus on the walls. My mom says it’s to honor him and that he’s always watching over us, but that makes me nervous.
I’m careful while I walk down the hall, until I reach the bedroom three doors down from mine, and I push the heavy wood door open as quietly as I can. It’s almost as dark in this room as it is in the hallway, except for the dim light coming from a small lamp on the dresser at the far end of the room. I still have to be careful not to trip over my own feet while I move next to the bed pressed up against the middle of the wall.
Dropping my blanket and pillow onto the floor, I sit down and arrange them into a sleeping bag just like I do every night.
I have to.
My big brother is asleep in his bed; or at least, I think he’s sleeping. Sometimes it’s hard for me to tell. My hands press into the mattress next to him while I sit up to watch him and make sure he’s okay.
He doesn’t have any hair anymore, and that scares me a lot. He wheezes in his sleep sometimes like the air can’t come in, or maybe like it hurts when it does, and that scares me a whole lot more.
God already made Nash go away.
My mom says that He might take Brody home to Heaven, but I have to make sure that He doesn’t.
When He made Nash go away, I watched him scream and cry. Our dad pulled and pulled and pulled on him while our mom forced his fingers off of the wooden trim in the hall. I don’t want Brody to scream and cry if God takes him to Heaven.
I don’t wantbothof my big brothers to go away.
I think maybe God scares me more than anything else.
Brody makes a sound deep in his throat while he rolls over, and his body jerks, so I reach under his bed for the big bowl thatone of the cleaner-people, Carla, gave me to hide for him. I hold the bowl next to the bed while he throws up into it, and I pat him on the back like our mom does for me when my tummy hurts.
It’s really gross, and it makes me think I might throw up, too, but I don’t.
My dad says that Brody’s a big boy and that he can get up to go to the bathroom on his own when he has to get sick, but the last time he tried to, he fell down by the door and hurt himself.
He cried for a long time.
It made me want to cry, too, but I didn’t.
I’m a big boy. I’m a Montgomery man. I’m strong.
“Give me the bowl,” Edie whispers as she comes into the room.
