Page 76 of Wait for Him

I try to shove the thought back where it came from, but I don’t have the strength. I do know better. Intelligence has not abandoned me entirely just because everything else has. I know violence is not some neat genetic inheritance tucked inside a chromosome, waiting for puberty before it crawls out. I know a baby is not guilty because of the man whose DNA helped make him.

I know all of that.

Still, the thought sits there.

Another one of him.

I can’t do this.

***

“What did the doctor say?” Michael asks while I plate the dinner that I don't even have a shred of appetite for.

He just turned fifteen. Mom and Dad have been gone for several months now, and we've still got years to go before anything about our lives feels remotely normal again. Some days I can almost pretend we're getting there. Most days I'm just keeping us both moving fast enough that neither of us has time to look down and notice there's still a crater where our old life used to be.

“It's my thyroid,” I tell him, easy as anything. “They've scheduled surgery in three months.”

The lie comes out clean.

Almost impressively so.

And technically, it's barely a lie at all. I do have surgery in three months. There will be a hospital, doctors, pain, recovery. I'm simply being creative about which organ is causing the problem.

A surgery to get this monster out of my body before it can take anything else from me.

“What does your thyroid have to do with you getting a big ass?” Michael asks around a mouthful of food, grinning like he's just delivered the finest joke in recorded history.

“Michael!”

I whip around so fast mashed potatoes launch off the serving spoon and land on the counter.

He immediately starts laughing.

“I am going to kick your ass for that. Thyroid issues cause weight gain, you know. For someone so smart, you'd think you'd have picked up a single useful fact about the endocrine system somewhere along the way, but all that genius went straight into the part of your brain responsible for insulting the only person who cooks for you.”

He shovels another bite into his mouth. “I was kidding.”

“Good. Because the next meal comes with a surcharge.”

“What's the surcharge?”

“You cook it yourself.”

His face twists in horror. “That's abusive.”

“Call CPS. I'm sure they'll be thrilled to hear your complaint.”

He grins around a mouthful of food, and I start to pick at mine.

After a few quiet minutes, he sets his fork down.

I glance up, and his face has gone serious on me, the way it does now, too fast and too often for fifteen.

"I was worried. I… am… worried."

"I'm okay, Michael. I am," I tell him.

Another lie. At this rate, I'll be running for office by Christmas.