Page 132 of Bound in Ashes

He squeezed tighter, and I looked down at him.

“It’s gonna be okay, baby,” he said.

The sob ripped out of my chest before I could stop it.

“It’s not going to be okay,” I said.

He squeezed, didn’t loosen his hold until I looked at him.

“It is,” Uncle Levi said.

I stared at him, and through his jaundiced eyes, his skin that was waxy, body that was frail and getting more frail by the day, I saw through all that. Saw what he tried to show me.

Saw that he believed it.

Prayed to every god that I could too.

“I love you, Uncle Levi,” I said.

He pulled me close to him, his strength surprising, and hugged me tight.

Hugged me the way I should have hugged him when Aunt Kathleen was gone.

Like always he was there for me in a way that no one else ever had been.

And ever would be.

I cried harder, the memory of Jack walking away filling my head.

I shook my head back and forth, trying to dislodge the image, then pulled back and looked down at Uncle Levi.

“It will be okay,” I said, patting his hand.

“It will,” he whispered, his voice sounding almost like his.

Asia

Uncle Levi was settled, and I’d even gotten him to eat some of the stew Bridget made. Only a couple of tablespoons, but it was something.

I brought it up in one of Aunt Kathleen’s tea cups.

Dirty pool, but Uncle Levi knew I broke out the porcelain to show how important this was. Knowing him like I did, he was doing it for us, not wanting to take resources, waste them on some old man he would say.

I smiled, shaking my head at his foolishness and looking down at the cup.

My stomach turned as I looked at the remnants of the stew in the cup. I wasn’t able to eat for the past couple of days, something that would have made me happy before, but was only proof of how irretrievably fucking pathetic I was.

“Oh, let me get that,” Bridget said, meeting me at the bottom of the stairs.

“It’s fine. I’m happy to do the dishes and help out in the kitchen,” I said.

“Asia, you have important things to do,” Bridget said.

“Bridget, everybody has important things to do,” I said.

“Yeah, but you got those goats back into the pen after they got out. I think that earned you a vacation from dish duty,” Bridget said.

I shook my head, remembering the incident the day before.