“Do you? With your brother?”
“Yeah. And my mom. She’s… sleeping now.”
I unlocked the door for her and pushed it open. The air inside smelled of carpet cleaner and dust. She set the box on the carpet inside the doorway. She looked around the small apartment, and for a moment, a fleeting look of sadness crossed her face and she sighed.
“It will be okay,” I told her with the logic only five-year-olds have. “It’s not so bad. I can help you do stuff. If you need it.”
“And that is the best thing I’ve heard all day,” she said. “You truly are a gentleman, Tyson.”
“Do you need some help? With the rest of your stuff?”
“I don’t have much.”
“Neither do we.”
“I have some boxes in the car. The bigger stuff will come tonight, I think. I would appreciate the help. We should probably speak to your mother first, though. I wouldn’t want you getting into trouble.”
“I won’t. She won’t care.”
She watched me closely. “She won’t, huh?”
“No. Honest. She’s sleeping, anyway, and doesn’t like to get woken up.”
“Well. Let’s go get the rest of the boxes, then, shall we? When we’re done, I think I have some lemonade mix we could stir up. Then we can sit and you can tell me about the book you’re reading.”
And we did just that. She was right when she’d said there wasn’t much. Only a few boxes in the back of her big car. Some were heavier than others, and she told me that her husband. Joseph, God love him, had given her most of what she still had. She’d had to sell a lot when she lost their house, but she’d kept the most important things. Her photos. The dishes he’d bought her. His work shirt. Her wedding dress. His pipe. All the things that made up who they were. She’d kept those things.
And we did just what she said. She found the lemonade, nothing more than a powdery mix to make with water. But somehow she made it sweet and tart at the same time, and it was the best thing I’d had in a long while. I sat in my ratty lawn chair and she sat on her own folding chair and she told me about the first time she’d gone to Narnia. And to Middle-earth. And to Mars. She liked to read, but now she mostly read romances with damsels in distress and swashbuckling heroes with swords and pirate ships. “I have to get my kicks somewhere,” she said without any hint of shame.
We were still sitting there when Bear came home that afternoon. “This is my big brother,” I said rather proudly. “He’s Derrick, but everyone calls him Bear.”
“Ah, I see,” she said as if she understood perfectly. I think she did. Somehow. “Then Bear it is.”
I could see the questions in his eyes about this strange old lady, but they could wait until later. I was just happy to have him home and to have a new friend. Nothing else really seemed to matter then.
When we said good-bye that first time, she hugged me. It was unexpected but not unwelcome. “I’ll see you soon,” she said. “I promise.”
And as jaded as I already was, as much anger and hurt I’d already seen, somehow, some way, I believed her.
And she kept that promise until the day she died. Weird, wonderful Mrs. Paquinn.
AND THOUGH I run now, running from the thundering in my ears, the beat of my heart, the sound of his voice in my head telling me that this bullshit was over and that he’d find me, all I can think about is her. How I left her behind, too, and not just him.
And even though he told me not to run, I do. I run toward her, because that seems to be the only place left I have to go. The Green Monstrosity is tense and awkward because of me. Dominic showed me too much today for me to stay there. I wouldn’t be able to breathe there anymore. Even out here in the open, it’s still difficult.
I stop only when I feel sand sneakers. The crash of the waves ahead. The call of the birds above. Somewhere a cell phone rings again and again, and I think it might be my own, but I can’t find it.
“I’m sorry,” I tell her, there on our little beach. “I’m sorry I’ve been away for so long. I didn’t mean to. I didn’t forget about you. Never. Not once. Not even for a minute.”
The smell of salt and grass. Wind blows through my hair. I wonder just how far her ashes have spread. She’s probably global by now. Just like she’d always wanted to be.
I sit down on the beach next to the little cross Anna made so long ago. Take off my shoes. Dig my toes into the sand.
The last time it’d been just me and her was the day Otter planned to propose to Bear. I remembered the poem we’d written together, him and me, telling him to not be scared, that even though it wasn’t technically legal, it was still better than eating a beagle.
Before her speech turned slurred and the side of her face drooped, before she collapsed to the floor, her head bouncing off the carpet with a n
oise I can still remember, before everything changed, she’d looked at me and said, “I have a feeling today is going to be the start of something wonderful for you and your brother, Ty. And you both deserve it so much. I don’t think I know two people who deserve it more.” She smiled sweetly at me. “Remember, okay? Remember that. You’ve been through the wringer, and times might get tough again, but everything good that happens to you is because you deserve it. You have your brother. And Otter. And Dominic. And Anna and Creed, and all the rest. That is what this whole thing is about. Family. That is all you need. It doesn’t matter where life takes you, as long as you remember them and this moment. That will make you who you are.”