MY SISTER GOT me a book from the library. I asked for it by name. It’s more up to date than Maya’s, but I won’t never forget Sister and Bailey. If I had a brother, I’d want one just like him. I say that out loud to Maleeka. Usually she would agree. Today it’s like she got stones for feet. Since she got in ten minutes ago, she still in the same place, staring out the window, spaced out.

“Sit on my bed. I’ll take the floor.”

She flop down on the floor right where she is. Drops her book bag. I go to her this time. “You sad?” The look on her face don’t change. “You mad? At me? What I do? I always do something, so I’ll just say it up front. I’m sorry.”

“It wasn’t you.” Her head goes down.

“Caleb. It was him. What he do? Break up with you?”

She shake her head no.

Opening the book, I read out loud even though we said we wouldn’t. In between my sentences, Maleeka whispers, “I thought it was stage three. It’s stage four.”

I hug her like I hug Cricket. “We friends. You my girl. Anything you need—”

She need to cry, I see. To let it out.

“You got a strong mother like I had a strong mother. She gonna be all right.” I say what everybody says, but I know people die from cancer … all the time. In my mind I ask Roxanne to ask God not to take her.

I take Maleeka’s hand. Walk her to the bathroom. I run water in the sink till it’s warm. Then I sit a washcloth in it. Cricket taught me how to go slow, be gentle especially around the eyes. Wiping, patting her face, I ask, “You wanna color?”

She nods.

I got her by the hand again when we walk in my room over to my closet. On my toes, I reach for my mother’s hatbox. It was empty when I got it. But I liked the pretty color—fuchsia. Emptying it out on my bed, I watch crayons roll around, happy. “Take your pick.”

I hid them before I left. ’Cause they’re extra special to me. Left over from when I was little, from her trips to the store with me, some never used.

Side by side, on our stomachs with our legs up, we not saying a word. I draw a heart. Put dark lines all through it. Then make different kinds of boxes that I fill in with my favorite colors. I never go outside the lines. I color faster than usual. Maleeka take her time. Moves in slow motion. Starts with a sun in the sky, Caribbean-blue clouds. Her stick people look like they on stilts. But I know that’s supposed to be her and her mother. They on the sand on the beach, holding hands.

Our crayons move over the page smooth as skates on ice. Our elbows touch. The sun making me squint sometimes when I look up at it. My fingers is happy though. Hers too. They pick up crayons. Move ’em fast and slow, leaving something pretty behind. She slow down, her breathing anyhow. Says I’m lucky to have a sister. “If something happened to my mom—” Maleeka reaching for the light pink one. Then the Pearl Gray. Her next picture is a house with them colors inside on the walls and furniture. “My mom says it’s not as bad as I think it is. But parents lie.”

“Don’t they.” I draw the ribbon. The symbol for breast cancer. It take up the whole page. She help me fill it in. We make it hot pink. After we done, I sign it.

On our backs, watching the moon come out, we talk about our mothers. Not about them being dead or dying. About the kinds of things we done with them when we was little. I run downstairs. Come up fast as I can. Flip through a photo album. She get to see me with my mom and dad. See how much I look like her and him, the clothes I wore, my hairdos back then. Out of nowhere, she take both my hands and squeezes.

“You scared?” I ask.

She shake her head yes.

“I stay scared now. All the time.”

“Momma does too. She try not to show it. But I see.” Her mother won’t talk about her treatments. She comes home. Gets sick. Loses her hair. Bought a wig. Says she’s okay when Maleeka asks if everything is all right. “But now—” Her legs shaking so hard it sounds like a dog’s tail hitting the floor. “Should I quit coming here, Char? Stop my after-school activities?”

“Did your mother ask you to do that?”

“No, but—” It’s the right thing to do, she say after a while.

I know. But I don’t want her to quit coming. Bet she don’t want that either. What I say is way different from that. “She your mother, Maleeka. Do what you gotta.”