Page 14 of Every Broken Promise
Why did she not say she was leaving?
The door to my room opened, and I burrowed my head into my pillow. I didn’t want my dad to know I was crying. He wouldmake me feel better, and then when he thought I was sleeping, I’d feel his body shake, and he would gasp for air. Like me, Daddy would also cry silently.
“Ty, are you sleeping?” I instantly recognized Astrid’s voice.
I lifted my head, and sure enough, through my blurry eyes, there she was. Her hair was in two braids. She wore a pink-and-purple shirt with black shorts.
“What are you doing here?” I was happy to see her. It felt like I had not seen her in forever.
“You haven’t been to school,” she replied softly.
She had been with me and my family the other day when we said goodbye to my mommy. At moments, I would be sitting in Daddy’s lap, and he would hug me as we both cried. Other times, my big brother Ezekiel hugged me to his chest, but the time I felt the safest was when Astrid sat next to me and held on to my hand.
“I’m sad, Astrid.”
Saying those words aloud to her felt okay. Every time I said them to my dad or brothers, they would lose the smile they managed to give me, and if I could avoid them feeling the same way I did, I would rather tell her than them.
“Why are you in the dark, Ty? It’s not bedtime yet.”
“It feels like nighttime all the time now,” I confessed.
Astrid scrunched her nose. She always looked very cute when she did that. Even in all my sadness, I still thought so. She walked over to me and sat on the edge of the bed—right on what used to be my momma’s spot.
“Wanna come to a sleepover with me? I promise to hold your hand all night.”
“Really?”
“Really,” she replied. “And in the morning, we can have some pancakes. Do you like pancakes?”
I nodded vigorously. Who didn’t love pancakes in the mornings?
“Come on. Your dad said it was okay,” she told me as she extended her hand for me to take.
I looked around my room and then at the side of the bed that Astrid occupied, the side my mommy no longer would use, and I took her hand.
Astrid did not let go of my hand—not when I said goodbye to my dad, not in the car ride to her house, not while we had dinner. Hand in hand, we made our way to her room, where she turned on her night-light. Once that was done, she let go of me.
“What side of the bed do you want to sleep on?” she asked me as she pulled back the covers to the bed.
“My mommy would lay on the right side when she put me to bed. She would play with my hair as she told me bedtime stories.”
My eyes teared up again.
Missing Mommy came and went like waves. Some were calm, but others were violent, and they threatened to bring me to my knees from pain.
Astrid noticed that my eyes had watered, but she didn’t comment on it.
“Is it okay if I sleep on the right side like your mommy did?”
My throat felt too heavy to answer, so I nodded.
“Do you want to borrow Mr. Sprinkles?”
Astrid pulled out a stuffed bunny that had an eyepatch.
I shook my head.
She didn’t seem bothered by this and instead put him on the counter facing us.
