Love Letters to the Dead(68)

I smiled. “Yeah. She was.”

Then I heard the front door open. “Dad?” I called.

Hannah seemed nervous suddenly. “Do you think he’ll like me?” she whispered.

“Of course,” I answered as we walked into the living room to say hi.

“Hey, Dad,” I said. “This is Hannah.”

I’d never seen Hannah that way before. She was like a little girl, shifting from foot to foot, wiping her palms on her dress. I guess she cared a lot what he thought. It made me sad, realizing how she probably didn’t have a lot of experience with parents. She extended her hand. “Hello, sir.”

My dad smiled. “Call me Jim. I’m so glad to finally meet you!”

“You too.”

“Are you girls hungry?” Dad asked. It had been forever since we’d really done anything for dinner other than microwave food, and it was usually me who made it. But then he said, “I was thinking of making Jim’s famous tacos.”

He was showing off for Hannah, I thought, and I smiled. I guess having my friend over brightened him up. He wanted to make things good for us.

So Dad cooked tacos, and we ate them together and then made Jiffy Pop and watched a movie on the couch. Dad let us pick, and we chose Midnight in Paris, which we all loved. The whole thing was surprisingly fun.

When we went to get ready for bed, Hannah borrowed pajamas. We were lying in my bed under the plastic glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling, trying to fall asleep, and then Hannah turned over and said, “I guess it’s, like, Jason’s just really pissed off at the world. Our parents are dead, and we got stuck with our grandparents, and he was supposed to get out on a football scholarship, and that got ruined. And I think that he gets scared for me, like I’ll f*ck up and I’ll get stuck here. The weirdest part is that I know I should hate him, but I don’t. I mean, of course I do in certain moments. But, you know, he’s my brother. And I still love him, too. Do you think that makes me crazy?”

“No,” I said. “I think that you can feel all of that stuff about him at once.” I thought of your quote, about how with real friends you can feel however you do.

“Hold on one minute,” I said. “I’ll be right back.” I wanted to do something nice for Hannah, and I had an idea. I tiptoed out of my room, pulled the attic stairs down from the ceiling, and climbed up into the dark, where May and I used to pretend that we were stowaway kids, hiding on a ship. I found the box marked Halloween and pulled it down. I opened it and found the matching pairs of wings that May and I wore, perfectly shaped and stretched over with gauzy panty hose, painted with patterns in glitter. I took May’s pair.

I brought them down to Hannah. “Here,” I said. “I thought you might need these. They’ll make you brave.”

She sat up in bed and stretched the elastic over her shoulders and smiled. “I love them.”

Yours,

Laurel




Dear Jim,

As we were getting ready for school this morning, Hannah put the wings on and announced, “I’m wearing these today.” And when we walked into the hall, she ignored everyone who stared at her.

I’d texted Natalie, and she agreed to meet us in the alley at lunch. Hannah had promised she’d talk to her. Hannah and I got there first, and when Natalie came up and leaned against the wall, the two of them just looked at each other for a long moment.

Finally Hannah broke the silence. “I do love you,” she said in a burst. “And I’m sorry. But it’s just scary. I’m not good at it. And I hate the way people talk. I don’t know if I want everyone to know, I mean, if I am ready to be together or something. But I promise that I’ll stop seeing other people.”

Natalie looked back at her. “Really?”

Hannah nodded, and then she went on quickly, as if her voice was trying to outrun the sob that wanted to break into it. “Something happened with Jason after that party. I mean, if you thought he was mad when he knew I was there with Kasey, you should have seen him after he found out about us in the bathroom. He was like, ‘That’s fine for dykes, but not my sister.’ I actually tried. I tried to stick up for us. He hit me. Anyway, he’s leaving sometime this summer.”

“What? He hit you?”

Hannah nodded. “Yeah. It’s okay. I mean, I’m okay.”

“It’s not okay. I hate him. I hate him so much. I hate anyone who hurts you. I love you.” Natalie rushed over and put her arms around Hannah. Hannah eventually let herself collapse into Natalie, her shoulder shaking as the tip of the fairy wing bumped against Natalie’s cheek.

Then Hannah reached her arm out in the direction of where I was standing. “Come on, Laurel, you can, too.” It was a joke-reference to when they used to tell me I could join in if they were making out. We all laughed as I went over to hug them both.

When we stopped hugging, I looked at them and asked, “What are we going to do?”

Natalie turned to Hannah and said, “Come live at my house for a little while. Until he’s gone. Will you?”

Hannah wiped the tears from her eyes and looked at Natalie nervously. “What will you tell your mom?”

“I’ll just tell her that you need somewhere to stay.”

“But what if she wants to know why? What if she wants to talk to my grandparents or something, or what if she finds out about Jason?”