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Somehow, through all the confusion and sadness, amid the tears and uncertainty, a tendril of joy slithers its way into my heart. I’m not sure what it means, but it causes my feet to move, and I start marching toward the direction of the tiny wail.
There, in the center of the living room, is a swing. It’s white and soft, singing lullabies and rocking back and forth, side to side. I almost don’t see her at first, swaddled inside a blush-pink blanket, but then a foot peeks out, kicking the air aimlessly.
My breath sticks in my throat.
Theo’s mother comes up behind me, her hand falling to my shoulder with a squeeze. “She’s eleven weeks old.”
There’s a lump in my neck that feels tight, so I try to swallow it down. I’ve never seen a foot so little before. She must be fragile, just like a snowflake when it lands on your skin. I’m too scared I’ll break her, so I just stare at her for a few seconds before a question pops into my mind. “Did you name her Butterfly?”
A burst of laughter greets me. Theo’s mother shakes her head as her fingers glide down my arm—a gentle touch, like Mom used to do. “Her name is June.”
June.
June always feels like a new beginning.
My own mother’s words sink into me, words I’ve buried deep. Words I’ve tried so hard not to think about. I slam my eyes shut when her face flickers in my mind, her warm eyes and silky hair. The shape of her face. The way her upper lip was thinner than the bottom one, but it didn’t make her smile any less perfect.
The truth is, my mother wasn’t wrong when she told me that June was a new beginning. It just wasn’t the beginning anybody wanted. It was the beginning of a horror movie, or a scary book. A nightmare. It was nothing like the magical fairy tales she’d read to me every night at bedtime.
I take a step back, away from the swaying cradle.
Maybe I don’t like Baby June.
Is she my wish? Is she what I traded my parents for?
Theo slides up beside me, fiddling with his overalls. “Do you like her, Brant?”
“I don’t know.”
All I know is that she’s here, and Mom and Dad aren’t.
“Come on,” Theo’s mom says, her tone a little lower, a little sadder. “Let’s get you set up in your new room, then we can have some cookies.”
It turns out that my new room is also Theo’s room. I guess I’ll be sleeping over for a while, and they ran out of rooms for me. June has her own room—the nursery, Theo called it—painted pink and gray, decorated with elephants, from her little wooden crib to the spinning mobile to the patterned border along her walls. I poked my head in, clutching my own elephant toy to my chest. I didn’t like her nursery because it made me think of Bubbles.
“How long do you think I’ll be here, Theo?” I ask my friend while pulling shirts and underwear and pajama sets out of my suitcase. Theo and I each have our own dresser, along with our own bed. There’s a television sitting atop a desk in between the two dressers, complemented by a Super Nintendo system, as well as a Nintendo 64. A few posters line the walls. I wonder if I’ll be able to bring over my favorite posters from my old bedroom.
Theo bounces on his bed with his butt, watching me unpack. “How long? Forever, I guess.”
“Forever?”
“That’s what my mom said.”
A strange feeling pinches my chest. Forever.
Aunt Kelly didn’t tell me much. She said the details didn’t matter, and the only thing that mattered was that I was safe. That I would be okay.
But forever is a really long time, and I wonder why she didn’t think that mattered.
Everything has been confusing since The Bad Night. So many strange people, so many questions I didn’t know how to answer. Aunt Kelly told me they were called social workers and thera-pits, and they were good people. They would help keep me safe.
I stayed at Aunt Kelly’s for a while. She said we had to wait for something called the Court to tell us what to do next. I didn’t know what that meant, but maybe it was the place where Theo and I play with our basketballs sometimes.
Aunt Kelly’s house was okay. She lives right over the Illinois border, in a little townhome in Wisconsin. Her cat had to stay locked up in the laundry room so I wouldn’t get bit again, but every time I walked by the gate, it would hiss at me. I couldn’t really sleep well, either, and most of her food tasted too spicy, but she was nice and treated me well. She gave me a handful of Skittles every night before bed and picked out all the purple ones. I don’t like purple. Aunt Kelly said the dentist might get mad at her, but at least I was going to sleep with something sweet.
I sit back down on my bed after my clothes are placed into drawers. Some things came from my old closet, and some things are new from Aunt Kelly. I put the old things on top of the new things so I can wear them first.
I’m twisting a loose string on the bedspread around my finger when Theo tosses me something. It’s a stuffed butterfly toy. “What’s this?” I wonder, squeezing it between my hands. It’s soft and bright, but it looks like a girl’s toy.
