What We Saw at Night

When I got home that night, I found something tucked in my backpack: her little stuffed penguin on skis. Juliet still slept with it even when she came to my house. It was the closest thing to a security blanket she’d ever admit holding onto. (Not surprisingly, she’d named him “Penguin.”) He smelled of the only cologne Juliet ever wore, Cartier de Lune. She’d never parted with him.

Part of me melted. The other part hardened. Was this just a cynical chess move on her part, to try to stay one step ahead of me? If she was willing to entrust me with Penguin, it meant our friendship could never be violated … right? It meant nothing fundamental had really changed and that she’d felt terrible about the minor things that had changed. Or she just wanted me to be her heart again, so I would leave the whole Blondie issue alone until she was ready to confide in me.

I was too tired to think about it. Angie had fallen asleep on the couch. I thanked Mrs. Staples for the emergency babysitting gig and sent her on her way with cash from the drawer, then carried Angie up to bed. I sat in the kitchen, waiting for Mom and eating crackers until I was nauseated and my stomach literally popped out. Glancing in a night-blackened window, I noticed I looked like crap, my unremoved makeup all running in the wake of my shower, my wet hair pulled up on top of my head in a ponytail. I basically resembled the Lorax from Dr. Seuss.

I must have fallen asleep at the kitchen table. When I lifted my head, the kitchen windows were still black. My mouth tasted awful, like dirty socks. I sat up and rubbed my eyes groggily. Mom was sitting beside me, knitting a quilt. As Jack-Jack is not a natural with any kind of needle except the kind you stick in a person, this was very slow going with much quiet swearing.

“What time is it?” I croaked.

“Around four,” Mom said. “You looked so peaceful. I didn’t want to wake you. And there’s no way I can sleep after the night I had.”

I bit my lip. “How’s Nicola’s mom?”

Jack-Jack sighed. “She’ll live. That’s what matters.”

I nodded. I stood and stretched. I filled a glass of water at the sink and sat back down. Mom kept her eyes on her needlework.

“I’ve been thinking about … my future,” I said. “I want to apply to colleges that specialize in criminal justice.”

“Okay,” my mother said. She held up two squares, different colors of purple, to see if they matched in size. “I kind of thought you’d study online.”

“Like a bird in a cage?” I said.

“No, like a person with a chronic illness who has to avoid certain situations. Your dad has provided for your education. You have a fund. I don’t want to do anything to stand in the way of whatever it is you want to do.”

“You sort of sound like Dr. Andrew right now—the way he talks to me in front of you. I have a theory, you know.”

“Oh? Please share.”

“He wants to get into your pants.”

“Well, if that’s true, then I appreciate that about him,” Jackie said. “He’s handsome and smart and could have his pick of the litter.”

I laughed. “Please don’t humiliate me by becoming a gold-digging mistress. Gina would do that, but not you.”

“Gina would not do that. Don’t humiliate yourself by putting down someone who loves you so much.”

“Ow! Guilt trip!”

“You are spoiling for a fight, Alexis, and I am not going to give you one. Maybe it’s because of your friend’s death. Maybe it’s because you’ve had hard times with Rob and Juliet. Maybe it’s hormones. Don’t take it out on me.”

“Let’s face it. Things would be easier if I hadn’t been born.”

Mom slammed her needles down on the table. “You’re an idiot,” she snapped.

I saw the dark rings under her eyes, purple bruises after a night of dealing with God-knows-what at the hospital. “You wish I didn’t have XP,” I said. I couldn’t stop.

“Don’t you?” Mom asked.

“Yes, but I’m not my mother.”

“Allie, just give it up. Whatever it is, just let it go. Don’t pick away at me like this. Say what you have to say and be done with it. I’m too tired right now.”

“That’s why you have Angela. She’s your backup kid. Right? She’s not the same as you, but at least she’ss healthy. You could get married again. You’re young enough to have another normal.…” I’m not sure why these words came cascading out, but I was too tired and confused to plug a hole in whatever dyke had held them back until now.

My mom stood. “I’m going to sleep. See you when you come back from Mars.”

She stomped to her room and turned up the volume of the radio so loud that the kitchen counter shook. It was possibly the most annoying song in the universe: “The Sound of Music.” The hills of Iron Harbor were definitely alive with its overblown theatrical crap. I almost had to laugh. Mom knew exactly how to punish me.

Angie woke up, of course, and stumbled into the kitchen, rubbing her eyes. She asked me what was wrong. I started to cry. Then she started to cry, almost out of obligatory duty. I banged on Jack-Jack’s door until my hand got sore.

Finally Mom appeared. Her eyes were huge and blotched with her own tears.

“Listen, Allie. Both of you. I wanted another child, for me. And yes, Allie, I wanted you to have a sibling because most kids who have what you have don’t have sisters. I wanted as big a family as I could have without a husband. And you know what? I might want to adopt another baby. And if I do, even if he or she is doomed to die of cancer at the age of four, I’ll love that child the same as I love you two.” Her voice sharpened. “The way I love you and Angie is not subject to debate. Do you understand?”

I swallowed. Angie and I exchanged a quick glance. I opened my mouth, and then closed it.

“What?” Mom barked.

“Juliet says … you only want to believe there’ll be a cure. As in, you want to believe in leprechauns.”

She sagged against the doorframe. “Why wouldn’t I? Juliet is smart, but she’s cynical enough for five Chicago politicians. If I could pray, I would pray. Some people see the hand of God in this and it actually comforts them.”

I nodded. If I opened my mouth again, I’d probably start crying again. Besides, my mother isn’t religious.

“Your grandmother is a practicing Catholic,” she mused, staring up at the ceiling and at the same time somehow staring straight through my skull again. “She said that it was wonderful how President Kennedy’s mother kept her faith. Because after Mrs. Kennedy’s second son, Senator Bobby Kennedy, got shot, old crazy Rose said something like: ‘God gave my children beauty and intelligence but not long life.’ ”

“That’s probably the best thing she could say,” I said.

“No,” Mom replied, her lips tight. “It sounded to me like Old Rose had ice instead of blood in her veins. I wanted to scream in my mother’s face: That woman loves God more than she loves her children!” She glanced down. Snapping out of her reverie, she kneeled in front of Angie and me. “Listen. I would rather let the world blow up and everyone in it than let anything hurt you. A God that gave up his own son for other people … I have to be honest. I don’t get it. I love you too much. I couldn’t do that.” She sniffled and arched an eyebrow. “Maybe that’s why I’m not God.”

I reached for her hand. She took it.

AFTER THAT THE three of us ate a half-gallon of ice cream. My mother didn’t even pretend she was going to put it in dessert bowls. She just yanked out the carton and cut the big rectangle into three blocks, which she doled out on dinner plates. Then she slopped on everything in the house she could find, from raspberry sauce to marshmallow fluff. Daytimers that they were, Mom and Angie started rubbing their eyes once they were finished. As soon as they’d gone to bed, I sat on the screened porch and tried to savor the last moments of darkness. I focused on how I was going to determine Blondie’s identity. The fact that Juliet refused even to say his name was the most telling piece of information I’d pulled from the horrible night. She couldn’t say who he was because she was afraid.

I could tell Jack-Jack everything Juliet had told me. But I couldn’t break my promise to Juliet. Or: Did she want me to break the promise? Did she know I would break it, anyway? There was no way out. I had built the birdcage myself.…

The rumble of an approaching car pierced my thoughts. I froze in panic for a second, and then I recognized the sound. I smiled crazily. A moment later, the headlights of Rob’s Jeep lurched into view and then went dark.

He flung open the door and hopped out.

I leapt like a cat into his arms.

I kissed him and he kissed me. We fell into the pine needles near the mouth of the driveway. Both of us were sweating, and I was afraid that I smelled and nervous that I didn’t have mascara on and hadn’t brushed my hair, or come to think of it, my teeth, since the previous night. He said, “You taste like marshmallows.”

“I was eating ice cream sundaes.”

“Do you want to go bouldering? I brought rope and gear. I thought maybe we could do what—”

“No, that’s not what I want,” I interrupted.

“What do you want?” Rob said, smoothing back my sweaty hair.

“I want to live,” I said. And Juliet’s words echoed in my brain: Everybody dies. But not everybody really lives. I glanced back at my mom’s bedroom. The window was dark. “Right here, right now.”

Rob hesitated. “Allie, are we …?”

“I am,” I finished for him. “With you. All my life. Always.”





At my four-times-a-year checkup that week, Dr. Andrew asked me if I was sexually active.

It wasn’t that I didn’t want to tell him, because he’d been my doctor ever since I was a kid. But right then, it felt as though he’d been always watching all of us in Iron Harbor, as though we were little figures in a snow globe.

“Yes,” I said. “Just recently.”

“You know, there is no one hundred percent safe kind of birth control. Using two forms is—”

“Mom’s a nurse,” I interrupted. “I could write a book.”

Dr. Andrew sighed. “I hope it’s a committed relationship, because you’re a good person, Allie. I’ll leave this issue in your mother’s hands.” He opened the examination door room.

“Thanks,” I said.

“I’m going to pass you onto a family practice doctor for this part of your cares now.”

I said, “Okay.” But then I jumped off the exam table. Blondie had just passed by the open door, wearing a white lab coat. His hair was shorter and the streak looked newly foiled, thicker than before.

“What’s wrong, Allie?” Dr. Andrew laid his warm fingers on my wrists, his eyes intent with concern.

“I thought I saw someone.…” My voice was barely a whisper. “A doctor who passed by. Who’s that?”

Dr. Andrew poked his head out. “Tim!” he called, waving. Blondie entered the examination room. “Tim, this is Allie Kim. She rules the nights of Iron Harbor. Allie, this is my son, Dr. Tim Tabor.”

Blondie extended his hand. Knowing that mine would feel like a claw of ice, I took it and gave it the sturdiest shake I could.

“Allie, hullo,” he said cheerfully.

I forced a sickly smile, my brain a kaleidoscope of awful memories, my pulse thudding loud enough so that I could hear the dull beat in my ears and wondered if he could, too. My eyes roved over every inch of his face. There was something different about it: the chin was square, and the wrinkles around his eyes more pronounced, but the eyes were the same. “You have an accent!” I finally said.

“All those years as a phony Brit.” He grinned crookedly at Dr. Andrew. “It’ll go away, at least for me. For my wife and our sons, not so much.”

Dr. Andrew placed his hand on his son’s shoulder. “Tim just got back from London. He was doing a research fellowship in surgical skin procedures. Now he’s here in the urbane town of Iron Harbor. Not much like London, huh Tim?”

“It’s home, Dad,” he said. He gave me a big, genial smile—with no hint that he’d ever seen me before. “You’ll have to excuse me. Nice to meet you, Allie.”

“Me, too—you, as well,” I stammered. I had never fainted, but I recognized the strange sensations I was having as the precursor to some kind of blackout. “Dr. Andrew, I need to lie back down for a moment.”

He peered down at me, his eyes narrow. “Are you eating well, Allie? Dieting too much?” He frowned. “Could you be pregnant?”

“It’s nothing,” I said. I squeezed my eyes shut until the vertigo evaporated. “Really, I’m fine. I’m not exactly sexually active enough to be pregnant.”

“It only takes once.”

“I’ve heard that. Let’s change the subject. You must be happy to have your son home.”

“Two down, one to go,” said Dr. Andrew. “My son Marcus is still in college. Undergrad. He won’t be a doctor though, like Drew and Tim. He’s studying journalism. I know he’ll write about all this. He’s bitten with the bug to translate the world of science. I think he’s having a pretty good time over in New Haven, too.” Typical of Dr. Andrew that he wouldn’t say the obvious school in New Haven: Yale. “Tim was in London a long time, almost six years. We only saw the little guy once. Now Tim and Drew are running around looking for land so Tim can build a house.”

I forced myself to focus on the conversation. “Didn’t he look around when he got here?”

“He just got here two weeks ago, Allie.”

“That’s all?” I almost shouted the words.

“You sound surprised. All they’ve been doing is getting used to life in Iron Harbor. You know, seeing my dad, who’s just thrilled, and Drew taking Tim fishing, like when they were kids, and we had the old boathouse.… My wife won’t let the grandbabies out of her sight.”

My spine stiffened. “Two weeks ago? Did he visit a lot before?”

“Not really. It was hard on all of us. Started work yesterday. I told him to take some time but that’s not the Tabor style.” He offered a faint, proud smile.

I fell back against the cushions and the crumpled white sanitary sheet. Should I ask Dr. Andrew for the name of a counselor? People with XP have a lot of psychological issues. Maybe this was a neurological issue. Maybe my brain was shrinking up.

Juliet was right.

I had seen her having an innocent conversation with our doctor’s son, also a doctor, who’d been in England when we saw Blondie in the apartment last spring. How Juliet knew Tim Tabor was a mystery to me. Why she was in a car with him in Duluth was even more of a mystery to me. Why she thought I was nuts was now, however, perfectly obvious. I had hallucinated the second “murder” scene.

But no. Of course I hadn’t. Besides, what accounted for … everything else? And how could I have had a hallucination of someone I’d never seen before?

“Listen,” Dr. Andrew said. “I’ll have you see Dr. Bonnie Sommers Olson for your gynecological care, instead of Gina. She’s just as nice. I’ll set it up for next week, okay?” He lowered his voice. “You are going to confide in your mother, though.”

I nodded. “Absolutely.”

As soon as he left, I texted Rob and Juliet.

2Nite The Cabin, 10.

“I KNOW WHO he is,” I told Juliet that night. “Not just that he exists. I met him.”

She stood with her back to me in the clearing in front of the deserted cabin, watching two loons crisscross the flat lake. The very arrogance of her pose, her tiny shrug, seemed to dismiss me. So what? Big deal! Rob’s Jeep came bumping up the track and he parked next to my mother’s minivan. He swung out quickly and kissed me hard.

“So it’s official,” Juliet said. “You two, I mean.”

“Yes,” Rob said for the both of us. “What, are you pissed?”

“No.”

“Juliet, you told me that’s all you ever really wanted.” He squeezed my hand. “For Allie and me to be happy together. Let’s just get this all out in the open, okay?”

“Yes!” she exclaimed, her voice harsh. “I did! Congratulations!”

I swallowed, not wanting to think about the conversation that Juliet and Rob must have had about me. “Juliet, please just answer me. Answer all of us. We all owe each other that much, right?”

“Answer what?” she asked.

“Why are you involved with somebody who is first, married, and second, a doctor—”

“A doctor?” she interrupted. I could see that Juliet was honestly baffled, which only frightened me more. “Who’s a doctor?”

“I was at the clinic today for my checkup. I saw him. I saw the blond streak on the back of his head. He was wearing a white coat. His name is Tim. Tim Tabor, Dr. Andrew’s oldest son … not that I’m telling you anything you don’t know.”

She shook her head. “I don’t know Tim Tabor.” She hesitated. “I know Dr. Andrew has a son, or two or three, and that one is a doctor.”

Rob let me go. He sat down hard on the ground, thrashed with bewilderment. “What the hell is going on here?”

“Juliet,” I said. “Pull the band of your jeans down.”

Her eyes glittered in the night. “You’re the one sleeping with Rob, dude. Not me. I only bare skin for—”

“She has a tat,” I interrupted. “Two initials right above her hip bone. And I know it has something to do with this guy.”

“You say,” Juliet whispered and smirked.

“What are you so scared of, Juliet?” Rob demanded.

“Show me.”

“Rob, come on.”

“Show me!” he shouted, jumping to his feet. “I know you’re lying, and I know Allie is telling the truth! I’ve seen the tattoo, Juliet! You think I haven’t? Enough! I’ve seen the initials G.T. in weird calligraphy. I’m sick of protecting you. It’s the world that ought to be afraid of you, Juliet, not the other way around.”

“If you only knew, Rob,” Juliet said. “I wish I could scare the world.” She turned her back to us again.

“Forget it,” Rob muttered. “Let’s just get out of here.” He reached for me, but I stepped towards her.

Juliet waved me off. She let out a deep, long sigh. “I promise I will find out what’s happened,” she said, her old, defeated persona taking over. “I can’t tell you more than I know. I have never met Tim Tabor, and I swear to God on that. The guy you saw at the Fire Festival, who was driving the car that night, is a friend.”

“A friend?” I said.

“He’s not bad. He’s made some bad decisions.”

I laughed. I couldn’t help it. “You sound like an abused wife. Next, you’ll say that I don’t understand him the way you do.”

“You don’t! But this has gone way further than I thought it would. I wanted to scare him a little, let him know that I was on to him. I knew he was seeing other women.” Juliet spoke as if she were talking to herself.

“But the guy’s, like … old,” Rob said.

Juliet stomped from the cover of the trees out into the moonlight. It splashed down around her body like spilled silver. “So what? Don’t you ever just want to shake up our lives? Scream? Grab someone by the throat? Make people see us? Does it matter who sees us? When they see us, we’re real. When I skied, everyone knew who I was. I wasn’t this … thing, this creature. Oh, the children of the midnight sun! The moon children!” She clasped her hands under her chin and batted her eyes in a parody of innocent bliss. “Poetry! How tragically lovely. What we really are is the human equivalent of cockroaches, scuttling around in the dark. Aren’t you tired of that?”

I backed away. “Not as tired as you are. There are things inside me that matter more than what idiots think.”

Juliet smiled sadly. “Idiots like Rob?”

“Screw you.” I resisted the urge to slap her.

“Yes, screw me, and goody for you two sweet things. The only thing inside me is the night. The freedom to do whatever I please. I want to live with that freedom inside me every moment.”

“No one lives like that, Juliet,” Rob said. “Movie stars have bad breath. Models have learning disabilities. Athletes have athlete’s foot. Nobody is free the way you dream.”

She shook her head. “You’re wrong, Rob. I was that free when I skied. I was that free when we started Parkour. But it wears off. I’m a drunk, like Gideon. I have to keep chasing that high.” Juliet lurched forward and grabbed the arm I’d broken, squeezing hard. “I can’t find something that lasts.

That’s why I have to do this.”

“Juliet, don’t run,” I said.

She let go and took a step back. Her eyes narrowed. “Have you told anyone?”

“No one. I just told Rob, here. Right now.”

“Told me what?” he demanded.

“Juliet wants to leave … she says G.T. is her ticket out of here.” I threw my hands up, hopelessly, towards the starry night sky. “She used to say G.T. meant ‘Great and Terrible.’ It’s what they called her when she was on the ski team. But now I’m pretty sure it means something else.”

She nodded. “You’re right, Allie. It does. There’s a network of the night. There are whole underground cities lived at night. In Europe. Even here. It’s not like I’d go to Florida and sizzle on a beach.”

“Who’s been selling you this crap?”

“People,” Juliet hissed. “Real people. People who’ve been outside this shitty little shitbox hole of a town.”

“Prove to me that this guy didn’t kill Nicola,” I said. “Then at least I’ll know that someone isn’t taking advantage of you. Prove to me that the girls I saw in that apartment are alive.”

“I don’t know what you saw, Allie. Okay? But I will try to find out! I’m only human. And as for Doctor Who, it’s not the same guy. It’s some kind of crazy coincidence. It doesn’t fit together. Give me a few days to find out. Just a few days.”

I stepped over to Rob and looped my arm in his. “If you agree to one thing.”

“What one thing?”

“Whatever I say,” I told her. “Otherwise, I rat. I tell your father, your mother, my mother, Rob’s mother, Dr. Andrew and everyone else I know until somebody believes me or locks you up.”

Juliet shifted on her feet. “What else can I do?” she asked.

“You can come back to us,” I said. “We’ll be a Tribe. We’ll be three.” I looked at Rob and he pressed his lips together, and then he nodded. “For now. Not a couple and a third wheel. We’ll be the tres compadres, like we were before. Just don’t take off.”

Juliet took a long breath and seemed to consider her options. “I promise. But, Allie. What are we going to do for the next three days?”

“We’ll trace,” said Rob. “We’ll boulder.”

“Exactly,” I agreed.

A FEW HOURS later, we were slick with sweat and spent. They’d taken me up to Superior Sanctuary, and I understood now why they’d fallen in love with it.

I also understood something else: Rob had only tagged along with Juliet and made those Dark Stars videos because he was as creeped out as I was by what had happened in Duluth. He wanted clues. And if doing Parkour with Juliet was the only way to get those clues, then that’s what he’d do.

You walk up Mount Everest. It is only for the strong, but most of it is walking. You are miserable, cold, oxygen-deprived and in Hell, possibly delirious and frostbitten, and you end up at the height at which planes fly. But not much of the experience is actually “climbing.” Climbing a mountain is grabbing onto one part of the mountain and then trying to hoist yourself up to the next handhold or footrest. It means having technical skill, using your boots for traction and an ice pick for leverage—and yes, a rope tied to a trusted friend, so you don’t fall.

Bouldering isn’t entirely like climbing. It’s based more on instinct, on grit and strength. You can boulder up a sheer slab: the side of a city building, a highway pylon, or a wall in your house, if you’re Rob.

For weeks, Rob had been practicing, so he could do Parkour with Juliet, to get some kind of insight into what was going on with her. Not that he’d ever, ever admit that to me. The closest I got to a confession was an offhand comment he tossed out as we all headed home in our respective rides to beat the sunrise.

“It’s worth giving you up for a little while to keep you forever,” he said, in front of Juliet, so she would hear.

As I learned much later, the same never held true for Juliet. We’d given her up a long time ago. And I didn’t need a few days to find out what was going on. I found out almost everything I needed to know the following night.





Before I went for my clinic visit with Dr. Bonnie Sommers Olson—yes, the woman who was going to give me the whole lowdown on being “sexually active” even though I’d met the criteria of that diagnosis precisely once—I submitted my first college application.

John Jay in New York has one of the oldest forensic programs in the United States. It’s one of the few that actually grant a bachelor’s degree in forensic science. I’d received the results of my ACT tests: a cumulative 29. (Apparently the broken arm had paid off.) That score would hopefully get me into quite a few places, and I also intended to apply at the University of Minnesota and the University of Wisconsin—both also great science schools. But John Jay was my first choice. Besides, I was almost 100% certain I was the only applicant with my very particular minority status.

DR. BONNIE LOOKED a little like Gina, only minus the gaudy makeup and painted nails and New York accent. She insisted I call her “Bonnie, just Bonnie” as I sat on the exam table. She asked if I was having trouble sleeping.

“Are you asking because it’s nearly ten at night?” I joked, a little too defensively.

“Allie, I’m more than familiar with XP,” she said. “I was thinking about the girl who died recently. Nicola Burns.”

I nodded, though my nightmares were waking: recurring visions of Blondie’s distorted, smiling face pressed to the glass at Tabor Oaks. I was almost tempted to ask if she knew Dr. Tim Tabor.

“Are you getting enough vitamin D?” she asked.

All of us at the Tabor Clinic took a hardcore vitamin D supplement because sunlight is its best natural provider. Ironically, vitamin D also helps you with sleep and with a host of other orderly ways of life: another cruel joke of XP. Then she recommended a birth control pill—with a little lower this, and a little less that—and gave me a wad of pamphlets that I handed back, explaining that my little sister had more knowledge of sexual congress just from having dinner every night with our mother. I also told her that vitamin D wouldn’t work on me. I was too strung out.

“Let’s try some more anyhow,” Bonnie said. “What else is going on?”

Well, I think a very dangerous person might be working at this hospital, and he has some weird power over my best friend. Oh, and either directly or indirectly he’s sort of ruined my life.… I almost started to cry.

“Allie, what’s really wrong?” Bonnie asked.

I straightened, regaining my composure. “It isn’t about me,” I said. “My best friend is involved with a guy who’s older. A lot older. But it’s not just the age thing. I think he’s dangerous to her in other ways.”

“Have you asked her to tell her parents?” Bonnie asked.

“No, she never would.”

“When you say dangerous, what do you mean?”

“I think he’s trying to convince her to run away.” Until I’d articulated it, the exact thought hadn’t even crystallized in my brain. But it was precisely what I was scared of. G.T.—whatever that meant—was her ticket out of here. Her words.

“That’s serious,” Bonnie said.

“It’s even more serious if you have XP.”

Bonnie nodded. “Try setting a deadline with her. Tell her that you care too much about her to let her do something that might wreck her life without thinking it over first.”

I mustered a smile. “I’ve done that.”

She turned and tapped the desk with her pencil. “Good. Tell her she has to see a psychologist. Maybe not even here. But somewhere. Tell her you’ll go with her.” She began to fill a prescription pad. “It’s a small town.”

“It is,” I agreed.

“The Nicola Burns tragedy has been hard for all of us,” Bonnie stated, snapping on her gloves. She told me to complain if anything pinched, then she started the exam.

“Yeah.” My eyes began to sting. “Nicola … She still wanted to hang out when I ignored her for, like, a year. I avoid Daytimers.”

“That’s what you call them?”

“It’s supposed to be contempt. But it’s envy.”

“That makes sense.” Bonnie laid her palm flat on my belly and tapped her finger against her joints. “Everything feels fine here.” The tapping made a hollow woodblock sound. “You’re using two forms of protection?”

“You betcha.”

“Let’s have a little blood.”

“They test me for everything but Ebola.”

She laughed. “You know better than to deny a doctor a little blood.”

For some reason, that set me off. I pictured Blondie, wandering these very halls. I started to cry. I hadn’t done so much crying since I was six.

Without a word, Bonnie folded me into her arms in a way no one except my mom ever has. She held me for two or three minutes, maybe even longer. I leaned against her, breathing in the smell of antiseptic mingled with shampoo and that over-dried hospital laundry scent I’d grown up with. Finally the tears stopped coming. I drew in a deep shaky breath and sat up straight again.

“I’m going to give you my cell phone number,” she said calmly. “Call or text whenever you want. I’m serious. It’s good to have another adult who isn’t related to you in your life. Or just another human being.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“I’m speaking from experience,” Bonnie said. “I’m having my own issues. I barely know Nicola’s mother. But every mother I know can empathize with how she reacted, even if she wouldn’t do it herself.”

I almost started crying again. Bonnie thought all this was about Nicola. I felt horribly guilty that it wasn’t.

“I do have a mother who says she loves me more than God,” I offered.

“And I believe her,” Bonnie replied, her voice soft. “I’ll let you skip the blood test for now. But not for long.”

I nodded, slipping off the exam table, embarrassed about the crying, embarrassed about telling this stranger that my mother loved me more than God. The office blinds were parted just a crack, and in the harsh glare of the parking lights, a flash of red caught my eye. My heart seized. The Alfa Romeo convertible was pulling up to the clinic entrance. I forced myself not to squint or stare. Instead, I took a slow breath and let it out slowly. If I had a meltdown, I wouldn’t find anything out.

“Hey, look! That is some car,” I said. “Does it belong to Tim Tabor?”

“No. His cousin. You know, the coach?”

My head began to buzz. “The coach?”

“Yes, the ski coach. At school.”

“At school?” I repeated.

“Well, not exactly. The team has kids from all over … you know, the team I can’t afford my younger son, Elliott, to be on.” Bonnie flashed a crooked, apologetic grin. “The one that wins championships all over.”

“The jumpers,” I said. “He coaches freestyle jumpers.”

My new nurse friend’s face brightened. “Exactly. You do know him.”

“Not … exactly.” My brain shut down, mostly out of guilt. Juliet never once mentioned the name of her ski coach. Why would she? I never wanted to talk about skiing. I only wanted her to stop, so she could hang out with Rob and me. And then my wish came true.

“Garrett,” Bonnie said. “That’s his name. When I hear about what those kids do, I think they’re an orthopedic ward waiting to happen. So it’s a mixed blessing Elliott is missing out.”

“You should see the things I do at night,” I forced myself to say. “I think I saw Dr. Andrew’s son driving that car, the one who has the white highlight in his hair?”

Bonnie laughed. “No, it was Garrett. Tim, the doctor, has a streak too. But he drives a little Toyota.”

I stared at her. “He has a blond streak? The doctor?”

“It’s not a fashion thing. It’s a birthmark, a place where there’s no pigment. It’s called poliosis. It’s as common as eye color. From the Greek word for ‘gray.’ That woman who hosts that show about bad clothes, I can’t think of her name, has one that goes right down the front of her hairline. That’s where they are most common. But they can develop anywhere, and anytime in your life. It runs in the Tabor family. But it’s not like I have to explain genetics to you.”

My mind whirled again. I blinked several times. “It’s not a sickness? Like XP?”

Bonnie shook her head. “No. According to the doctor he’s dating, Garrett’s very healthy indeed.” She slapped her hand over her mouth and laughed. “Now I’m gossiping. Time to leave, young lady!”

MY MOTHER PICKED me up in the circle drive. We drove slowly past the red sports car. I asked her if she knew Garrett Tabor.

Garrett Tabor. G.T. G.T. G.T.

She looked surprised. I think she was all set for a heart-to-heart talk about the import of my doctor visit in the wake of what had happened with Rob. Not that I’d told her, but of course she knew. She was Jack-Jack. I wasn’t ungrateful for an excuse to postpone that little chat. You can have the most open-minded mother on earth, but there are still going to be things that are uncomfortable.

“Well,” my mother said. “I know who he is. He’s an a*shole.”

I almost smiled. The wonderful thing about my mother: she is so socially reticent on delicate subjects. “How so?”

“He’s screwing one of the residents, and I mean that in every sense of the word,” she said. “Anyway, he’s Dr. Stephen’s son. Why do you ask?”

“He’s a ski coach,” I said.

“Right. Oh … he coached Juliet! That’s why you’re wondering. For a while, he coached in upstate New York someplace. Now he’s back here full time.”

“So he’s really an a*shole, huh? But Dr. Stephen is so nice.”

“Good people have rotten kids. Look at my own fate.”

“Ho, ho. Ha, ha. Tee hee.”

Mom chuckled, but her grip tightened on the steering wheel as we rounded the corner onto the road that led home. “Can you keep a secret?” she asked with a conspiratorial grin.

“Jack-Jack, please. I’m insulted.”

“He’s definitely sleeping with Dr. Olson’s friend, Dr. Wilenbrand.” Her voice dropped to a stage whisper. “But he’s also sleeping with Gina.”

“Gina? She’s older than he is! Lots! And you told me she wasn’t a gold-digging mistress!”

“That’s not illegal,” Mom muttered.

Still, I thought … Gina was a single mom with two daughters older than Angela, but younger than me. In past summers, Gina and Mom spent vacation time together between the dark and the light, bringing out sandwiches and sunscreen for all us little girls so we could splash in kiddie pools. On the other hand, maybe it did make sense. More than once, Gina had announced (after a few beers) that she wished she’d never met her husband, and that she wished he could have just mailed her his sperm to produce Regina and Ronnie.

“Maybe Gina thinks she could end up with a piece of the Tabor pie,” Mom said in the silence.

I stared ahead at the road. “I can’t believe Gina would be with that guy. She’s so strong and tough.…” But so was Juliet. Had Juliet really gone all the way with him? You don’t tat a guy’s initials on your belly because he helped you master a triple twist.

“It’s worse because Lauren Wilenbrand works with Gina and me, and Lauren’s about twenty-eight years old.” Mom sighed. “I guess people see what they see.”