Page 28 of How to Walk Away

All of this bustling busy-ness seemed oddly cheerful on the surface. Every professional I interacted with had a pleasant, just-another-day-at-the-office demeanor, and yet I strongly suspected they were faking. I know for sure that I was. I kept things calm, I stayed pleasant, I took my medicine—but the truth is, I had woken up in a dystopic world, one so different that even all the colors were in a minor key, more like a sour, washed-out old photograph than anything real.

It looked that way, and it felt that way, too.

I couldn’t imagine the future, and I couldn’t—wouldn’t—even think about the past. And by “the past,” I mean ten days earlier. My past hadn’t even had time to fade: It had been severed from me—the whole history of who I’d been, what I did, anything I’d ever dared to hope for—gone.

That kind of thing puts quite a spin on your perception.

By that evening, I was so tired, I had hopes I might actually sleep through the night. Exhaustion is a friend to the grieving. I was the kind of tired where sleep just reaches out and tugs you into its gentle sea without you ever making a choice. Just as I was giving in and closing my eyes, the door opened again.

And it was my sister, Kitty. With a suitcase.

Seven

KITTY HESITATED ATthe door. “Hey, Mags,” she said.

When I didn’t respond, she held her hand up in a little wave.

“I know you said you didn’t want me to come,” she said. “But I came anyway. Obviously.”

I just stared.

She didn’t step in. She waited for permission that I wasn’t prepared to give.

Three years. Three years of unanswered emails and phone messages. Three years of nothing, and now here she was.

She looked utterly different from the sister I’d last seen. She had short, spiky hair now, bleached a bright yellow, instead of the shoulder-length brown I’d always known. She had little hoop earrings going up the sides of both ears. She had no makeup except for bright red lipstick. She had a ring in her nose like a cow.

But of course, I knew her at once. Even after all this time.

“Nice nose ring,” I said.

“So—can I come in?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” I said. I wasn’t sure I was up for it.

“Just a quick minute,” she promised.

“I’m super tired.”

“I just want to say hi.” There was a nervous energy to the way she stood, as if she were standing on the edge of some tall building’s flat roof rather than just in my doorway.

I felt that same energy—a little bit of that same stomach-dropping feeling. Plus, so many different things all at once—surprised, uncertain, annoyed. She could havecalled,right? She could have let me know she was coming, at least. Did I really need some weird stealth attack from her right now? She’d had three years to get in touch, and she’d waited until I literally couldn’t escape. It felt like too much. My instinct was to send her away.

But I couldn’t.

Part of me wanted her to stay. A bigger part than I’d realized.

“Fine,” I said, and I kept my eyes on her face as she walked closer.

She set down her bag as she stepped to the side of my bed.

“Hi,” she said.

“Dad said you were in town.”

She nodded.

“Have you seen him?” I asked.

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