They Called My Death a Tantrum, So I Stayed Dead novel · Chapter 15 of 24

Chapter 15: Midnight in the Kitchen

"Pierce?" my mother said again. "Who can you see?"

Pierce kept his eyes on me for one more heartbeat.

Then he looked down and wiped his face with his sleeve.

"Nobody," he said. "I'm just tired, Mom. I want to sit in the kitchen a while by myself."

"I'm not leaving you."

"Please. Just a while."

My father took her by the elbow.

She went with him up the stairs, looking back over her shoulder every third step.

The kitchen light stayed on.

I did not move from the hall.

Pierce sat at the table, put his wrist on the wood in front of him, and said without raising his head, "You can come in. I won't scream."

I came in.

I sat in the chair across from him, where the tea had gone cold.

"Did it hurt?" he said.

"Yes."

"How long?"

"I lay down Thursday afternoon. I stopped at nine forty-six."

He flinched.

For a minute neither of us said anything.

The refrigerator hummed, and the number on his wrist burned red.

Nine.

"I broke that wrist getting you out of the back seat," I said.

"I know."

"You were screaming. The door was jammed. I used my shoulder and then my hand."

"I know, Ewan."

"You've known for three weeks."

"I watched you hide it at every meal." His voice was rough. "I watched you cut your food with your left hand, and I watched Mom not notice, and I thought, say something. Say it so they'll look."

"I said it three times."

"You said it like you were apologizing."

I had no answer to that, and he knew it.

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