Part 59 (1/2)

She started to put her arm around him, but it was weighed down with the

white plaster cast. That had the fear bubbling quick again. She could

hear in her mind the sound of that dry snap, the screaming pain that had

followed.

It hadn't been a dream-and if it had been real, then the rest ...

”Where's Darren?”

She would ask that first, Brian thought as he squeezed his eyes tightly

shut. How could he tell her? How could he tell her what he had yet to

understand or believe himself ? She was only a child. His only child.

”Emma.” He kissed her cheek, her temple, her forehead, as if somehow

that would ease the pain, for both of them. He took her hand. ”Do you

remember when I told you a story about angels, about how they live in

heaven?”

”They fly and play music and never hurt each other.”

Oh, he was clever, Brian thought bitterly, so clever to have woven such

a pretty tale. ”Yes, that's right. Sometimes special people become

angels.” He reached far back for his Catholic faith and found it weighed

heavily on his shoulders. ”Sometimes G.o.d loves these people so much he

wants them with him up in heaven. That's where Darren is now. He's an

angel in heaven.”

”No.” For the first time since she had crawled out from beneath the

dirty sink over three years before, she pushed away from her father. ”I

don't want him to be an angel.”

”Neither do I.”

”Tell G.o.d to send him back,” she said furiously. ”Right now.”

”I can't.” The tears were coming again; he couldn't stop them.