Chapter 21: Shells

"Yes," I told him on the phone. "That part is true."

He let out a long, unsteady sound and passed the phone back to his mother without saying goodbye.

Three weeks later, on a gray Saturday in January, Regina and Jasper came to Harlow Bay.

Margery stood on the porch of the gray house with her arms folded against the cold.

She was the second adult in the room, as Regina had agreed.

Maisie sat on the steps in her yellow raincoat and a wool hat, swinging her boots.

"Is he going to hit me?" she asked me for the third time.

"No."

"How do you know?"

"Because I'll be standing right there. And because he doesn't want to."

She considered that.

A rented car turned into the street and stopped by the curb.

Regina got out first, in the gray coat and a scarf.

Jasper climbed out the other side in a coat that fit him now.

He held a paper bag in both hands.

He stopped on the sidewalk and did not come up the path.

"Hi," Maisie said.

"Hi."

She looked at his face and then at his bag.

"You can come up if you want. But you can't hit."

"I know," Jasper said. "I'm not going to ever."

"Okay."

"I'm sorry I did it."

"Okay," Maisie said. "Look. I have a scar."

She held up her palm.

"It hurts a little when it's cold. Grandma Margery says it'll stop."

He stared at the pink line across her palm.

His mouth wobbled.

"I made you something," he said, and thrust out the bag. "I made it after the hospital. Daddy said I couldn't give it to you."

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