“I reckon it’s time to start again.” I grinned. “Aim for the silver ones!”
She craned her neck and gave it a try, but I could tell she wouldn’t be able to do it alone. So I let off the brake on her wheelchair and rolled her toward a patch of silver flakes within her easy reach. She nabbed one, then another, shivering with delight as they landed on her tongue. A new breeze blew, though, carrying the starlight off a ways. I quick pushed Penny in that direction now. We had a hoot and a half, there on that rooftop, me rolling Penny all around, her alternately pointing and crying out, “Over there! There! Got one!”
By the time she’d tasted a good dozen or so, we were laughing so hard our eyes shone with their own silver water.
“Genuine, don’t you want to try?” Penny asked, beaming.
“Naw. These are for you,” I told her. Then I whispered Penny’s wishes into the night.
And Penny kept on smiling, and we kept on laughing, and we chased snowflakes across the rooftop until the last of the starlight ones had fallen and we were chasing plain old snow for the fun of it.
“Oh, Genuine,” sighed Penny.
“Yes, ma’am?”
“It’s good, don’t you think?”
I flared my nostrils and felt, for all the world, that my heart might burst. “Yes. I surely do.”
Not long after, a heavy snow began to fall in earnest.
Tom was still fired; one too many times he’d tried to sneak a shaman, a faith healer—or a wish fetcher—into the cancer center, it seemed. But now that we were all good friends, Penny invited us five to spend the night in her room. There was a reclining chair for Tom and a little sofa where Miz Tromp could stretch out. Travis and I went to the nurses’ station to ask for a heap of pillows so we could sleep on the floor, but they said that wasn’t hygienic and brought us in a couple low cots instead.
They also brought us a tray of ice cream cups. Plus, Penny’s room had cable TV—every channel! We scooped out chocolate, strawberry, and vanilla swirl with tiny wooden spoons as we watched a movie about a pod of dolphins who turned out to be space aliens. Travis and Penny and Edie and me laughed a lot. Tom and Miz Tromp seemed to spend a lot of the time whispering to one another, smiling and agreeing.
In time, folks started dozing off. All except for me and Travis, that is. Both of us were completely wore out and completely wide awake. We pushed our cots together so we could whisper-talk.
“Looks like Ma’s wish come true.” Travis nodded glumly in Miz Tromp’s direction, then Tom’s.
“Maybe. You’re not happy for her?” I asked, less than pleased to see the oldy-moldy Travis rear his head.
“No. I am. I know she’s been lonesome,” he replied. “But it is worrying.”
“What is?”
“What’ll happen when he leaves, like Pa did? It took an age for us to build our lives back up again. Ma workin’ an outside job to keep her plant business open. Me, too little to do much but get in her way.” He was truly anxious, I could tell.
“Things might work out different this time.”
“Yeah.” Scratching at a speck on his hospital blanket, he added, “You did good tonight.”
“I ain’t sure I did anything at all,” I told him. “Penny seemed to do most of the hard stuff.” Nudging him with an elbow, I joshed, “Bet you’re wishin’ tomorrow was a school day so we could have off for snow.”
“Naw. Then I’d be sittin’ at my desk doing sums, instead of spending the day with you.” A touch flustered, he added, “You know. As friends.”
I considered him, in his shaggy blackness. His dark jacket and Converse shoes with the boot chain sat on the floor beside his cot. Such a peculiar boy.
But for some reason, I found myself thinking of reaching out a fingertip to touch one of the snaps on the jacket.
This is Travis Tromp! I reminded myself. He could be angry and pushy and—I’ll say it—a little chauvinistic, with all that “baby” stuff. He was as goofy as a snaggletoothed pup, too. But despite all of that . . .
Despite all of that—now, don’t you laugh—
“I reckon you ought to kiss me now, Travis.”
He didn’t wait for me to ask a second time. His lips were soft and warm, and I especially liked the way he interwove the fingers of his hand with mine. Suddenly, I was toasty all the way down to my toes.
He turned away, sort of bashful-like, but he was grinning. “My ma told me I might stand a better chance with a certain girl if I stopped operating under the influence of dumb.”
“She’s a wise woman, your ma,” I said.
We fell asleep holding hands.
It was the cold that woke me up.
I wrapped myself in my blanket and looked blearily around. Penny and Edie snuggled together in the hospital bed. Miz Tromp and Tom and Travis all seemed fine. Nobody shivered, no one’s covers were drawn up to their chin. And yet, there I was, my teeth chattering so hard I felt sure the sound would wake someone.
Pulling the blanket still tighter around me, I padded to the window just in time to see a meteor shoot across the sky, burning like a star.
Make a wish, I thought, recalling the old hem tale about wishing on shooting stars.
I wouldn’t really do it, of course. It might break the wish fetcher’s first rule. But if I did wish, if I could wish, what would I choose? My belly was full. I was surrounded by friends.
Truth was, other than some extra covers to stem my curious chill, I didn’t want for a single thing.
17
Delay
I WOKE TO THE SOUND OF TOM’S WHISPERING VOICE. “The pavement’s a little icy. I say we wait until the sun’s good and high.”
“That’s fine,” Penny replied softly. “Y’all can stay and help me pack.”
“Don’t you want to give yourself a day or two, Mama?” Edie asked.
I cracked an eyelid and looked around. I was the only one still dozing. Miz Tromp, Tom, the Waltons, even Travis, all sat with breakfast plates on their laps.
“She’s awake!” Penny smiled.