Room 14's Secret novel · Chapter 19 of 24
Chapter 19: Aunt Leanne
Leanne's room at the county hospital had a window onto a garden and a chair that folded out into a bed.
On Wednesday afternoon she was sitting up in it, in Zachary's flannel shirt over a hospital gown, with a plate of toast on her knees.
She had gained a little color.
Posy stood in the doorway in her raincoat and did not come in.
"Posy, this is Leanne," I said. "Daddy's friend from long ago. She's Zachary's sister."
"Are you the lady from the end room?"
The toast stopped halfway to Leanne's mouth.
"How do you know about the end room?" Leanne asked.
"Aunt Giselle told Daddy on the phone. She said, 'The lady in the end room is no trouble.'" Posy frowned. "I think she meant you."
Leanne put the toast down.
"I think she did," she said. "I'm no trouble at all. You can come closer, if you want. I won't break."
Posy came across the floor in her yellow boots and stopped at the bed.
She studied Leanne's cropped hair, her thin hands, her brother's shirt.
"Your hair is short like a boy's," she said.
"I did it myself, with a plastic knife," Leanne said gravely. "It's been a bad five years for haircuts."
Posy laughed, a surprised little sound.
Then she climbed up and sat on the end of the bed, and the room was easier to be in.
"I have to tell you something," she said to Leanne. "I told Mommy I didn't tell. But I saw."
"What did you see, sweetheart?" I said.
My voice came out even.
"Aunt Giselle put the white stuff in the tea. In the kitchen when you were at the sink with the baby." Posy turned a button on her coat. "Daddy only carried it. He cried every time."
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