Chapter 16: Robot Leg

Erik stepped out of the elevator and put himself between us.

He did it without thinking, the way he'd do it on the ice.

"It's after midnight," he said. "She's had her transplant today. You don't get to do this tonight."

"I know what day it is," Nils said. "That's why I'm here."

"You sent the drawing back."

"I know."

"She doesn't know. We didn't tell her."

"Good."

Nils looked past him at me.

"Ten minutes. In that lounge with the fish. Then I'm gone, and you can do whatever you want with it."

I looked at Erik.

He looked at me.

Seven years ago, the boy in front of us used to eat pancakes at my elbow and steal the bacon off my plate.

"Ten minutes," I said.

We rode back up in silence.

Nils stood in the corner of the elevator with his hands in his parka pockets.

His leg clicked once when the car stopped.

The sixth floor was dim and quiet.

The night nurses looked up and then very carefully looked down again.

Nils stopped in the hall outside 614.

The curtain was open a foot.

Ingrid was asleep on her side with Sheriff the moose under her chin and the empty IV bag still hanging on the pole above her.

The nurse's tape still said DADDY JUICE.

Jodie was in the chair, half asleep, her mouth open.

Nils stood at the glass.

He didn't try to go in.

He just looked.

"She's so small," he said.

"She's lost six pounds this week," I said.

He nodded.

He put two fingers against the glass, very lightly, and took them away.

Then he went into the family lounge and sat down in the corner of the couch, under the fish tank, where he could see the door.

Erik didn't sit.

He leaned against the wall by the window with his arms crossed.

I sat in the chair across from Nils.

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