Alex, who had been quietly composed all this time, turned to Papa now and burst into tears. I couldn’t watch as Papa embraced our boy and fought back his own emotions so that Alex might find the courage to go with two people he’d only met yesterday.
I looked away as the Dabneys peeled Alex out of Papa’s arms and put him in their truck while he cried and yelled, “I don’t want to go! I don’t want to go!”
Evie, wise Evie, kept her smarts about her. “We’ll see you soon! Before you know it, my darling!” she said, her voice sounding a bit shrill as she forced a happy tone into it.
I heard the truck door slam shut against Alex’s sobs and then the puttering of the engine as the truck eased off into traffic. And all the while Evie shouted, “It’ll be all right! It’ll be all right!” while Papa just stood there and said nothing at all.
I opened my eyes and stared at Evie, hating her for becoming a doctor and working at an asylum and for figuring out why one Ursula Novak wanted to kill herself.
If only she had become a teacher or a chemist or a librarian.
Why, of all the lunatics at that hospital, did Evie have to get paired up with Alex’s real sister? Dora had said earlier that surely it was fate, the heavens trying to make right what had gone wrong seven years ago.
Don’t talk to me about fate,I wanted to say to Dora.Fateis just another word for saying we’re all powerless. Me. Mama. Papa. Maggie. All of us.
Love something long enough and true enough and fate will tear it right out of your hands if it chooses, and there’s nothing you can do about it.
