Page 81 of For Fox Sake

Including one Velveteen Rabbit. I reach over and pluck it off the pillow, resting it in my lap and rubbing at the ear, softened with age and time.

Footsteps sound down the hall and then stop.

I look up.

Archer is staring at me with his mouth open. “Uh, you all right?”

“Yeah. I needed to get this...” I look down at the stuffed animal in my hands. I can’t see Ryan right now. I’m too raw. Too needy. “Will you bring this down to Ryan and Ari? They can’t find hers.”

“Sure, man. Absolutely.” He crosses into the room, and I hand over the rabbit.

He hesitates in the doorway, tapping the frame with a finger, his mouth opening and then shutting, and then thankfully he stalks away.

I wasn’t ready to come into this room, but now I’m not sure I’m ready to leave.

It hurts. But the pain has changed. I will never stop missing her. Ever. But something has shifted inside me since I found out about Aria’s heart and Mia and little Ari. It’s like... I’m still wrecked, but it’s different. I still miss her more than life itself, but the sharp edge of pain has dulled into a blunt ache.

On the nightstand, there’s another framed photo of our ultrasound picture. Just a bunch of blurry dots on a black background. Dad found it in an old box and Aria insisted on framing it.

I’m hurled back into the memory, Aria’s wide, excited eyes, her laughing mouth as she held it up and proclaimed, “Our first photo!”

We came into this world together and I never wanted to be in it without her. She’s always been a part of me. She will always be a part of me. It’s unfathomable that she’s gone.

The black and white image swims in front of my eyes, hot tears disappearing into the dark bedspread.

I swipe them away.

“Hey.” Finley strides inside, her eyes wide and concerned. She perches next to me on the bed.

I set the photo back on the nightstand. “Did Archer make you come here?”

She puts an arm around me, her head pressing against my shoulder. “He didn’t make me do anything. But he did look like he’d seen three ghosts, a demon, and a life-sized spider playing poker. He was seriously freaked.”

I lean my head on hers. “You’ve been cleaning in here.”

“Just dusting a bit here and there, yeah.”

“Is it... hard for you? To come in here? See all this?”

“Yes, and no.” She straightens. “Losing Aria was hard for all of us. But it was the worst for you.”

I stare down at a yellow nail polish stain on the faded rug at my feet. “She was a part of me.”

I don’t know how else to describe it.

It can’t be described.

“You always knew exactly where she was.”

“What do you mean?”

“Like that time we went on a hike to Mayberry Falls, it was me you, Aria, and Dad and she wandered off. Remember?”

“No.”

“I think you were about nine, maybe? Anyway, she went to pee but then never came back. We started yelling for her, going in the direction she had walked off, but then Dad just looked at you and said, ‘Point to where she is.’ You did, which was not the same direction she had gone to pee, but we found her a minute later. She had seen a deer and tried to follow it and got turned around and couldn’t find her way back.”

I search my memory banks and come up empty. “I don’t remember that.”

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