Chapter 3
Lily reached under her blanket and pulled out half a blueberry muffin wrapped in a napkin. Emily had brought it home from the club the night before. Lily had saved it, as always, because she never ate anything all at once. Poverty had trained even her hunger to be careful.
“Give him this,” Lily whispered. “Sick people need food.”
Emily almost refused, but Lily’s little face was so earnest that she took the muffin and carried it to the doorway.
Nathan stared at it.
“What is that?”
“A peace offering from a nine-year-old.”
He looked past her to Lily, who lifted one weak hand in a shy wave.
Something moved across Nathan’s face so quickly Emily almost missed it. Shock, maybe. Or grief. He accepted the muffin as if it were fragile glass.
“Tell her thank you,” he said.
“Tell her yourself.”
His eyes flicked to Emily, annoyed. Then, to her surprise, he stepped into the room.
Lily smiled at him. “My name is Lily.”
“Nathan.”
“Are you really sick?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know any stories?”
He looked at Emily as if she had set a trap.
Emily folded her arms. “Well?”
Nathan sat carefully on the chair near the bed. He looked like a king forced to attend a kindergarten tea party.
“I know one story,” he said at last. “About two brothers who grew up with nothing.”
Lily listened.
So did Emily.
Nathan spoke quietly. He told a version stripped of crime, blood, and names. Two boys on the South Side. Cold winters. Stolen bread. A younger brother named Danny who believed the older one could fix anything. Then one day, the older brother trusted the wrong man, and Danny never came home.
Nathan stopped there.
Lily’s eyes had grown heavy. “That’s a sad story.”
“Yes,” Nathan said.
“You should tell a happy one next time.”
The words hung in the room.
Next time.
Nathan looked at Emily. She expected him to reject it, to step away from the softness before it reached him.
May you like
Instead, he said, “I’ll try.”
By noon, Nathan could stand without swaying. By afternoon, he had found a pay phone two blocks away and made three calls so short they sounded like codes. He returned with his face colder than before.
