My heart is beating out of my chest, waiting. Dani will want to hear them too. She’ll be so happy to know Tanya wasn’t alone in the end.
I tip my head forward. “Yes.”
“She said, ‘They’re gonna be alright.’”
I won’t make a liar out of you, Tanya.
After I beat Victor in two of our three games of chess, I leave.
I start to head to the gallery, but Bailey texts me that she won’t be in today because she’s having an MS day. On its face that’s not concerning. Multiple sclerosis can rob you of the strength in your muscles. It does in Bailey’s case, at least. It’s been hard to see my baby sister go through this, but I’ve come to terms with the fact that sometimes the fatigue wins and she has to allow her body the time to rest.
Bailey’s apartment is shrouded in darkness when I walk in. That’s not surprising because she lives like a vampire most of the time, but the silence is off-putting.
Bailey can never sit in silence. The sounds of music or TV are always booming through the halls of her place. She usually has her AirPods in at the office so she can constantly listen to whatever playlist or podcast she wants. She can’t even sleep without some kind of sound playing, so the overarching quiet doesn’t sit right with me.
She’s not on her couch, so I rush back to her bedroom, not even bothering with knocking before barging in.
“Now why the hell would you be sitting here like that?” Her weird ass is under the covers, sitting straight up with her arms folded across her chest.
“Because I knew your Papa Smurf head ass was gonna come over here, and I wanted to hear you coming. I was about to fall back asleep, so I’m glad you came when you did. I needed my bit to pay off.” She pushes a button on her phone and a cover from Vitamin String Quartet startsplaying through her speaker. I laugh when she turns over and pretends to snore.
“But forreal, you tired, sore, or both?”
She sighs. “I’m exhausted like no amount of sleep will fix it and my legs feel really heavy. But do not start doing the most. I just need to rest. I don’t need you to do a damn thing.”
“So you don’t want the salad I got you from DiPasquale’s?”
She blinks one eye open and sits up again. “Well, go on and get it. I can’t, I’m simply too weak.” She holds the back of her hand up to her forehead and sighs dramatically.
I grab a sweater off the chair in her room and launch it at her.
“You do know you don’t have to come over every time I’m MSing, right?” she asks, not looking at me as she bites into a piece of eggplant from her salad. Not long after she was diagnosed, she started referring to having flare-ups as “MSing.” She found that it was easier to explain her symptoms to us when she related them to PMS symptoms.
Of course I know I don’t have to come over for every rough day, but she’s my baby. I know she can take care of herself, but it’s my job to protect her. She has a habit of not asking for help, so I like to see her face-to-face to know if she’s being honest with me and herself about how she’s feeling.
“I know, Franky. Pass me the remote.” This is our normal routine when she has an MS day. I come over with food, she reminds me I don’t have to do that while eating; I turn onOne Piecefor us to watch until she falls asleep; and then I clean around her house and take stock of things she needs so I can make a store run.
She tosses the remote at me, still chomping away at her salad. “Let’s watch the Marineford Arc. I could use a good cry,” she says around a mouthful.
I’ve seen all the episodes ofOne Pieceonly because I’ve been watching it since it came out in the nineties. Bailey hasn’t because we tend to skip around, ignore some filler episodes entirely, and revisit her favorite arcs rather than progressing.
I settle into her swivel chair, which is probably the most comfortable chair I’ve ever sat on, and she moves the remnants of her salad over to her nightstand, sinking deeper into bed.
I expect her to audibly sigh when Ace meets Shanks the way she does every time we watch these episodes, but she doesn’t. Instead, she’s watching me warily.
“You good?” I pause the TV.
“Why didn’t you tell Dani about my MS?”
The question knocks me so off guard, I have to blink slowly to process. “Wait, what?”
She pushes herself up farther, flopping her hands in her lap. “Why didn’t you ever tell Dani about my MS? Weren’t you two dating or whatever when the signs first started showing?”
All those years ago, when Bailey’s symptoms were—rightfully so—scaring the shit out of her, I made the decision to come home from New York and help her find out what was going on.
I didn’t tell Dani because I didn’t know what to say. I was scared too. We didn’t know what was going on with Bailey, why her legs were failing her at random times and why her vision kept getting drastically worse, and the doctors we went to either couldn’t figure it out or didn’t care to listen to her complaints.
Our mom and dad wanted to drop everything to take care of her. Our mom was ready to walk away from the daycare center she dedicated her life to in order to spend every minute of every day running Bailey back and forth to different hospitals. When she wasn’t doing that, she was helping our dad, who had injured his knee badly at work and needed surgery and then months of physical therapy.
