Chapter 29: Family History

The county hospital's emergency room was empty at four in the morning, except for us.

The nurse at the desk was the same one who had asked Lottie for Birdie's family history on the night of the fever.

She looked at the child in my arms, and at the blood in her braid, and she said nothing.

She just pointed to a bed.

Birdie's wrist was broken in one place, and the cut on her scalp took four stitches.

She held very still for all of it.

She had the horse tucked under her chin, and she held my sleeve in her good hand the whole time.

Dean sat on the other side of the bed.

He did not let go of her fingers.

"I have to ask a few questions," the nurse said, with her pen over the clipboard. "Allergies. Anything on her father's side?"

Nobody spoke.

Dean looked up at her.

"I'm her father," he said. "Dean Odom."

The nurse looked at him for a moment.

"Yes," she said. "I thought so. You've got her forehead."

"Penicillin," Dean said. "I've been allergic since I was five. My sister's got the same card. I'd guess she has it too."

The nurse wrote it down.

She wrote it in a slow, careful hand, and she underlined it twice.

"Thank you, Mr. Odom," she said.

Behind the curtain, Birdie turned her face into my side.

"Is that what daddies do?" she whispered. "They say what you're allergic to?"

"That's one thing," I said.

"Mama always said it to the nurses. But she said it quiet, so nobody would hear."

Dean put his forehead down on the bed rail.

The deputy came in at five.

He had the acknowledgment in a clear bag.

Jesse had gone out to the hall with him, and I heard him through the curtain, his voice flat.

"I've never been to that town. I've never had that notary's stamp on anything. That's not my hand."

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