I nodded, remembering the recipe my sister recited before I left for school. Considering all that happened the night before, it was no surprise I never slept. Not long after the sun came up, a car turned into the driveway. Peeking through my window, I glimpsed Cora tugging the Hulk into her backseat while Rose burst through the front door and began vomiting downstairs.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Rose said, wiping her mouth and straightening up after I followed the retching sound to the kitchen. The green makeup was washed from her face, though clumps still clung to her hair. “You’re thinking: don’t puke in the sink. But who says the toilet’s the only place a person can puke? Now that I think about it, the sink’s way more sanitary.”
Actually, I’d been thinking about the boys who had come to the door and the light in the basement. I opened my mouth to tell her about them, but Rose broke in before I could speak.
“I’m going to make a pizza. Want some?”
“You’re cooking?”
She reached for a 7-Eleven bag on the table. “Here’s my recipe: open box, remove frozen crap, nuke in microwave. I’m no Julia What’s-Her-Tits, but I’ll manage.”
“The poem has nothing to do with your situation,” Boshoff was saying, luring me back to the here and now of his office. “But it contains a few lines that might offer you a helpful approach. It’s called ‘Little Things’ by Sharon Olds. I would have written it down, except I was in bed with my book-light on, so I didn’t have a pen. Plus, I didn’t want to wake my wife. She needs her rest these days.”
The tight-fitting band on his finger should have led me to consider the existence of a Mrs. Boshoff, but I never had. When I tried to picture her what came was a woman with white hair and rosy cheeks, a kind of Mrs. Claus, tucked under the covers beside him. “Why does she need her rest?” I asked.
Boshoff quit clacking his cough drop. “I’m afraid my wife’s not well.”
I knew how it felt when people pushed on a sensitive topic, so I told him I was sorry, but I didn’t ask more. He nodded his thanks and we let that be enough. I watched him slip on his glasses and lean over his desk, doing his best to recall the poem. As his pencil scratched across the pad, I felt Albert Lynch’s eyes upon me. Since there had only been one witness at the church—me—I wondered who could have come forward to clear his name.
“Here we go, Sylvie. I can’t remember the entire poem. Just the part that made me think of you.” Boshoff swiveled his chair in my direction and read aloud. When he was done, he pulled off his glasses and asked if the passage put me in mind of anything in particular. I had no clue, so I shook my head before remembering to speak my answer. Glasses back on, he tried again. This time, I listened carefully as he read: “ ‘I learned to love the little things about him, because of all the big things I could not love, no one could, it would be wrong to.’
“As I told you, Sylvie, the poem itself is about an unrelated topic. However, those lines might offer a way for you to think about your sister.”
I learned to love the little things about Rose, because of all the big things I could not love, no one could, it would be wrong to.
Never once had I mentioned the larger blame I placed on my sister for making that call and luring them to the church or my role in not telling the police about it, but perhaps Boshoff had sensed something in my silence, the way my mother once taught me to do.
“Do you think you could try that, Sylvie? Since you have to live with her for the next few years at least, it might help you to focus on the positive.”
“I’ll try,” I said, unable to muster even a hint of enthusiasm in my voice.
“Well, why don’t we start by making a list of little things about her that are lovable? We can begin it together. Do you have the journal I gave you?”
That small violet book came with me everywhere in my father’s tote, since leaving it home meant Rose might discover all I’d been writing there about the things from our past I did not want to forget, like that night with Dot, that trip to Ocala and what came after. On account of what I’d written, I didn’t like the idea of taking it out, so I told Boshoff I didn’t have it. He riffled through the desk and found a pad instead. In his sloppy script, he wrote “Little Things” at the top, numbers one through three down the side, before handing it to me.
“You once mentioned Rose has a nice voice when she sings with the radio. That seems like a small enough thing to love, right?”
Reluctantly, I wrote: My sister has a decent singing voice.
When I was done, I stared at the impossibly vast spaces beside those next two numbers. “I’m sorry,” I said, my gaze shifting to Albert Lynch in that photo once more. “I’m not feeling well. Do you mind if we stop?”
This time, Boshoff’s gaze followed mine to the wastebasket. His lips parted and he brought a finger to his mouth, like he was pushing a button there and turning something off. “Sylvie, you’re aware I share this office with a handful of rotating staff. I got here a short while before you today. Had I noticed the paper there, I would have removed—”