Chapter 23: The Donor Garden

I found my sister in the donor garden behind the hospital, on a stone bench under a bare tree.

She had no coat, and her white silk dress was wet at the hem.

Justin had stopped at the garden gate. "I'll be here," he said, and stayed.

I walked up the path with Cora's purse in my hand.

She did not look up.

"They sent you," she said.

"Nobody sent me. Mom doesn't know I left."

"Then why?"

I held out the purse.

"Your pills are in the side pocket. Take tonight's."

She stared at the purse. For a moment I thought she wouldn't touch it.

Then she opened the clasp, shook two capsules into her palm, and swallowed them dry.

I sat at the other end of the bench.

The garden was lit by a few low lamps, and every stone had a name cut into it.

I had walked through here once on the way to my pre-op appointment, and I hadn't read one.

"Reed's gone," Cora said.

"I know."

"The hospital took my name off the program. The president said I could go home and rest."

She laughed, small and wet.

"Mom looked at me and didn't know me. Daddy wouldn't speak."

"They heard your voice."

"I know what they heard."

She pulled her knees up onto the bench, in the ruined dress, and wrapped both arms around them.

She looked sixteen.

"You could have let me die," Cora said.

"You could have walked out of that lab and never come back. You had every reason. Why didn't you?"

It was the first honest question she had ever asked me.

I thought about it properly before I answered.

"Because you were my sister," I said.

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