TWENTY-TWO

Sue took one look at my face, one look at Lucy clinging to me, and bolted out the back door. I punched 911 on the phone and waited for someone to answer, then burst into tears trying to explain what had happened.

“An ambulance is on the way, stay with me,” the lady said. “Stay on the phone until they get there—can you do that?”

“Yes.” I was trying hard to stop crying because it was making everything scarier for Lucy, but every time I thought I’d gotten myself under control, I’d hiccup, then cry again.

“Is anyone else with you?”

“Her little sister, Lucy.”

“How old is she?”

I pulled Lucy tighter to me with my free arm. “Five.”

“Did she see it happen?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, here’s what I want you to say to her. Tell her, ‘Help is on the way, it’s going to be okay.’ Can you do that?”

I jiggled Lucy. “Lu? The lady says help is on the way and it’s going to be okay. Can you hear me?”

She nodded, her eyes still pressed into my neck. The back door crashed open and slammed against the wall. Sue grabbed the phone from me.

“This is Sue. Is the ambulance on the way?”

The 911 lady said something, then Sue said, “We’re in the far end of the field on the left side of the driveway. She’s not conscious.”

Lucy wailed and gripped me tighter.

“Yes, I’m going now.” She shoved the phone at me. “Put on the Closed sign and lock the door!” Then she disappeared out back.

Still cradling the phone on my shoulder, I hefted Lucy to the door, pulled the sign, and locked the bolt. The 911 lady was still talking. “The ambulance will be there within one minute now. Sit tight and stay on the phone. Let me know when you hear the sirens.”

“It’s me. Sue went out.”

“I know, it’s okay. Sue is a trained EMT—she knows what to do.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“You must be new.”

“Three months,” I said.

“Got it. How old are you?”

“Almost thirteen.”

“Well, you are doing the job of an adult and you’re doing it very well. Be proud of yourself.”

“Okay.”

“Sometimes we don’t get to pick when we start acting like an adult, do we?”

“No.”

“I bet you can solve all kinds of adult problems already anyway, am I right?”

“I don’t know.”

“You should be able to hear the sirens now. Can you?”

I moved the phone away from my ear to listen. “Yes.”

“Once you see them pull in, we’ll hang up and you can get a book or something to read to Lucy. Keep her mind occupied. Do you understand that?”

“Yes.”

The ambulance lights flashed red and yellow. The siren cut off when they stopped by the fence. “They’re here.”

“Okay, hon, you did a great job. Superb. You call me back if you need anything, okay?”

“Yes, ma’am, thank you.”

“Good luck.”

I hung up and wrapped both arms around Lucy. Through the window I watched the EMTs brace Biz’s neck and head and lift her onto the stretcher. Bile rose in my throat. The 911 operator had said I’d done the job of an adult. Right that second I think I’d rather have been able to bury my face in someone else’s neck and still be the kid.

Lucy looked up when the ambulance sirens started again and yelped like a homesick puppy when she saw Sue’s Jeep pulling out of the driveway right behind it. I smoothed the hair on her head, patted her back, and repeated words over and over like Mama did when I was little and upset. Somehow, in adult mode, those words felt useless.

Footsteps tapped on the stairs. Sonnet came from the back of the store, her face red and smushed like she’d napped through the entire event.

“Sue called. She said we should get ahold of James.”

“Did she tell you what happened?”

She sounded like a robot. “Yes.”

“It was horrible,” Lucy sobbed. “She might be dead.”

“She’s not dead.” I said. “They wouldn’t have the sirens on if she was—”

Sonnet pulled an index card out of a box under the counter and handed it to me. “Call James. I’ll go put the pony away.” Her calmness was unnerving.

Miss Hilly answered on the second ring. “I have an emergency for James. May I speak to him please?”

“Is this Magnolia Grace?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Haily already called. He’s on his way to the hospital.” She took in a deep breath on the other end of the phone. “I’m closing the library. I’ll come get you and take you home. Just stay there with the girls for now, okay?”

“I can call my mother,” I said quickly. I really badly did not want to have to ride even one mile in a car with Miss Hilly. She was always wound up so tight, and we needed calm.

“I’m already on my way,” she said.

The phone went dead.

Thirty minutes later, we pulled up in front of the house in Miss Hilly’s tiny Volkswagen. Mama rushed down the front steps, strands of hair pancaked between layers of tinfoil and artificial color. Her face was covered in red splotches and her eyes were wet.

“Oh my sweetness, my sugar. Deacon told me—he’s gone to the hospital.” She turned to Miss Hilly. “I was just getting something on my head to pick them up.”

I didn’t wait around to hear Miss Hilly give a breathless account of what happened. I’d seen the whole thing, live and in person.

Sonnet followed me and Lucy to the kitchen and went right to the fridge. “Do you have Coke?”

“Bottom shelf.”

She pulled one out, found two glasses and filled them with ice, then poured soda into them.

“It’s a Coke, Lu,” she said, putting a glass on the table in front of us.

A few minutes later the front door banged shut. Mama rushed into the kitchen and unattached Lucy’s tiny arms from my neck, gathered her into her lap, and sat down, making cooing noises that sounded like the pigeons in Atlanta.

“Sugar, get us some rice pudding, would you? Rice pudding fixes everything—right, Lucy?”

Sonnet sketched birds in her notebook while I microwaved a bowl of pudding and tried to remember Mama ever holding me like that. One tiny spoonful at a time, she fed Lucy until her eyes got heavy, her head bobbed, and she finally fell asleep with her cheek pressed into a piece of tinfoil on Mama’s shoulder.

“Can you pull this stuff off my head, please? My hair’s going to be green after all this time.”

I unwound the foil pieces and tossed them in the trash.

“Thank you. Now prop some pillows there on the couch. I’m going to try to lay her down for a bit,” Mama whispered.

Even in her sleep, Lucy didn’t want to let go and started to cry. Mama sank onto the cushions with Lucy curled into a ball on her lap.

“I’ll just sit here with her, then. See to the other one, okay? What’s her name again?”

“Sonnet.”

“That’s an interesting name. It must be Asian.”

Sonnet scratched loudly in the notebook. I leaned really close to Mama and whispered, “It’s a type of a poem.”

“An Asian poem?”

“No, Mama. Just a poem.”

James called about nine o’clock. Biz had been transported by helicopter to a hospital in Boston. He didn’t have anything else to report, except to ask if Sonnet and Lucy could stay with us overnight. Lucy was already bundled up in Mama’s bed eating ice cream with her. I gave Sonnet my room and curled up on the couch, since the guest room was still filled with moving boxes, but I couldn’t sleep. I stared into the dark all night and wondered if I’d done something wrong to make the accident happen. Did Kori know Biz’s helmet wasn’t buckled? Should I have asked if the girls were telling the truth about it being okay?

I was still awake when the light outside turned from ebony to gray.

None of us went to school that day. Mama barely let go of Lucy for nearly twenty-four hours, except to let her sit on the kitchen counter while she baked tray after tray of biscuits, then fed them, slathered with honey and butter and Georgia-peach jam, to the girls. White flour drifted everywhere, including on Mama’s eyelashes.

Around four o’clock, Deacon came to take the girls to Boston.

“Can I go with you?” I asked.

“Probably not,” he said. “They’ll be staying with family close to the hospital. Sue and Kori won’t feel right until they’re all together.”

“Just on the drive there and back,” I pleaded, stung by his reference to their all being together when it didn’t include me. “Lucy will feel better if I’m with her.”

“Sugar, stop, let the family have privacy,” Mama said.

She handed Lucy to Deacon, then wrapped up biscuits with ham and honey, and threw apples and a small Tupperware container of rice pudding into a bag and gave it to Sonnet. Lucy leaned over, grabbed the back of Mama’s head, and kissed her on the cheek. Mama teared up, and put her palm over the place where Lucy kissed her, and smiled like she’d never been kissed by a child before. When everyone had left, I went into the bathroom and threw up.