Page 170 of The Glittering Edge

Alonso speeds into the hospital parking lot, leaving the car spread across three spaces. At the entrance, they wait for an excruciating moment as the revolving door moves in a slow circle, and then they shoot past the reception area to the elevators, where Alonso presses the button at least fifteen times before the elevator arrives. As they pile in, there’s a shout.

“Hold the doors!”

Corey’s dad appears. When he takes in the strange crew in the elevator, he pauses, expression darkening as his eyes dart from face to face. Helen appears behind him a moment later.

“Last call,” Alonso says.

Helen steps on and grabs her brother’s shirt, pulling him in after her.

The ride up is silent, but the second the doors open, they’re all running again, ignoring the nurses who shout at them to slow down. Penny reaches Anita’s room first, and Alonso stops behind her. The door is open, with nurses running in and out, frantic and speaking in low voices. One of them sees Penny and gasps. “Penny! We’ve been trying to call you.”

“What is it?” Penny asks.

The nurse notices how many people are there, her face growing more panicked. “Perhaps we should talk privately.”

But Penny is already walking into Anita’s hospital room, her hand alighting on the threshold. “Mom?”

There’s no answer.

Penny

“MOM?”

Penny keeps expecting her to answer. She saw Anita a few minutes ago. She can still hear her voice, and she can’t reconcile that with what she’s seeing.

Her mom is in the hospital bed. Around her, all the monitors are dark, and she’s no longer connected to the IVs and wires. Her chest isn’t rising and falling and the color in her cheeks is gone.

“Oh my god, no,” Naomi mutters, her voice cracking.

Penny steps into the room. Alonso and Corey are close behind her, but they’re barely real. Nothing is real except the fact that her mom is gone.

Penny falls to her knees.

Corey

COREY WAS THERE WHEN HIS MOM DIED. IT’S A COLD FACT. BUT HISyoung brain blocked it out, and he’s never been able to remember the exact moment when it happened.

That changes when Penny starts to cry.

In his head, Corey is seven years old. He’s in the back seat of his mom’s SUV as it stops on the train tracks.

“Mama?” he says, but she ignores him as she keeps turning the key in the ignition. When the engine doesn’t turn over, she clutches the steering wheel.

“Why aren’t we moving?” Corey asks.

“Get out of the car, Corey,” his mom says, her voice shaking.

“But—”

“Out,” she snaps. “Now.”

In the distance, there’s a train whistle. Corey’s eyes well up with tears, because he hates it when his mom is mad at him. “I don’t want to.”

His mom sighs and then she takes off her necklace. When she turns to hand it to him, her expression is soft. “Can you take this for me? I don’t need it anymore.”

It’s the gold necklace with the crescent moon. Tanya never takes it off, but if she wants him to hold it, that’s fine. Corey shrugs and grabs it.

“Now do me a favor,” his mom says. “Take this phone and call your dad. Tell him you’re by the tracks on the east side of town.”

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