Stay

by Bobbie Pyron

  Fire looks up. Her eyes widen. “Whoa,” she says.

  There, walking across the park, are Ree and Ajax. Behind them are Linda and Duke.

  “Those are some big dogs.” Fire scoots closer to Karina.

  My heart lifts to see that tall woman with the long ropes of dreadlocks and her big ol’ silver dog. I haven’t seen them in days.

  I wave like crazy. “Hey!” I call out. “It’s me, Piper!” Which I realize is kind of a stupid thing to say.

  Ree smiles her one-sided smile. She swings her pack to the ground like it’s as light as a feather, which, I know for a fact, it is not.

  “Hey, yourself,” she says. Linda waves from behind Ree and says in a real shy voice, “Hi.”

  “Is that a dog or a pony?” Fire asks, pointing at Duke.

  A smile breaks across Linda’s face. “He’s a Great Dane and my best friend. His name is Duke.”

  Fire shakes her head in wonder. “He better be a really good friend for all the food he probably eats. I bet he could eat two bags of dog chow a day!”

  Ree laughs. “Our dogs don’t want for much,” she says with pride.

  “Speaking of dogs,” she says, “what’s the word on Baby?”

  We fill Ree and Linda in on what all we’ve found out about Baby and Jewel. Ree grabs on tight to each bit of information, keen as a hawk.

  “I bet you’re right about where Jewel was going,” she says. “And because she ran out of her medication, she lost her way.”

  Linda nods. “That happens to a lot of people living on the street.”

  I wonder what Linda’s story is.

  Karina, who’s been quiet since Ree showed up, finally says, “I think the two most important things right now are to let the doctors at the hospital know she needs these pills and to find out where her sister is.”

  Ree smiles with admiration. “I do like a girl with a plan.”

  “It’s her superpower,” I explain. “Planning, I mean.”

  Ree laughs from deep down in her belly.

  Karina looks at her watch. “It’s almost four, probably too late to go to the hospital now.”

  “Maybe we can go right after school tomorrow,” I say.

  Fire grins. “No school tomorrow, though. It’s a teacher workday.”

  Hope rushes through my veins. “Perfect! We can go to the hospital tomorrow. We’ll take the pill bottles and postcards—and, oh, there’s photographs too.”

  “How will we get there?” Karina asks.

  “Bus,” Ree says. “I’ll go with you so you don’t get lost.”

  Fire thrusts her chin up. “We’re Firefly Girls. We won’t get lost.”

  “But,” Karina says, “they may not allow kids in to see patients without an adult. Hospitals have rules, you know.” Karina finds comfort in rules.

  Linda nods. “Ree,” she says, “I’ll keep Ajax while you go with the girls, okay?”

  “Thanks, Linda,” I say.

  She smiles and tucks a strand of brown hair behind her ear. “Anything for Jewel.”

  “And for Baby,” I say.

  Daddy’s working late again tonight; Mama says, not for the first time, she’s about at her wit’s end.

  “He acts like all I do is sit around all day and night reading trashy paperback novels and painting my toenails,” she says, shoving our newly cleaned clothes into drawers.

  She shakes a sock at me. “Well, let me tell you,” she says, the freckles on her face popping, “I’m working from sunup until sundown and after.” She crams the sock into a drawer and slams it closed. “And I don’t get paid!”

  Dylan and I look at each other with big eyes.

  Mama brushes her hair out of her eyes. She holds out her hand. “Come on, Dylan. Bath time.”

  While Mama gives Dylan his bath, I pull out the photographs from Jewel’s suitcase and lay them out in two rows on the bed. I touch each one.

  A small house with blue shutters and a big tree in the front yard.

  A grainy black-and-white photo of a man with a little girl on his shoulders.

  Another black-and-white photo of two girls playing with a dog.

  A teenage girl sitting straight and perfect at a piano on a stage.

  Two not-very-old women, arms thrown around each other, legs kicked out straight, laughing their heads off.

  A tiny black and brown puppy with white paws and a white patch on his head.

  I add the photo of the fall recital too.

  The fall recital! Jewel had written that on the back. Maybe she’d written on the backs of the others. I flip them over, one by one.

  Home

  Daddy

  Sis, me, and Joe

  Audition

  Sisters

  Baby

  Baby. Sis. Home. Family. All the most important things in the world.

  39

  The Wind

  Baby walks on the end of a leash,

  out into the warm fall sun

  across dry grass and

  fallen leaves,

  something he has done before.

  Baby walks beside someone else,

  someone not Jewel,

  something he has never done before.

  He lifts his black, wet nose

  and searches the wind,

  something he has done many times.

  Baby searches the wind

  for answers.

  Where is his home?

  Where is his Jewel?

  Why are they apart?

  The man at the other end

  of the leash

  sits down on a bench,

  pats Baby’s small, fine head.

  The hand is gentle.

  It is the same hand that sets out bowls of food

  every morning

  up and down the rows of kennels,

  always the same.

  Every day, the same.

  The same light,

  the same smells of

  Food

  Water

  Poop

  Pee

  Soap

  Baby misses every day being

  a new day

  with his Jewel.

  Baby turns his back to the man

  and his hands

  and the bench

  and the big building filled with barking,

  desperate dogs,

  and sniffs.

  The wind brings no answers.

  He scratches at the collar around his neck.

  It twists and slips up toward his ears and,

  just for a moment,

  Baby tries to work it over his head.

  If only . . .

  The man stands and

  gives the leash a little tug.

  “Let’s go,” he says.

  Baby’s heart leaps. His two favorite words!

  He wags his tail and starts an

  all-over wiggle

  until

  the man turns toward the building that is not

  in any way

  where Baby wants to go.

  Baby does something he has rarely done

  in his seven years on this earth:

  he refuses to go.

  Baby pulls back.

  The collar slips a bit

  toward his ears.

  Baby’s heart leaps with Maybe.

  His body quivers with Hope!

  His feet are ready to run!

  The hand reaches down.

  The hand scoops him up.

  “Time to go back inside, little guy,”

  the man says.

  40

  Telling About

  There’re five of us stuffed into Mrs. Bailey’s car, Henry. Turns out she didn’t have to work today because she is a teacher’s aide, so we don’t have to ride the bus. Karina wanted to come too, but she volunteered to watch Dylan so Mama could come instead. Given how excitable Ree can be, having Mama’s negotiation superpowers might come in handy.

  There was no way Fire was staying behind. She doesn�
��t trust us to make sure the doctors know about Jewel’s pills.

  “Do you think they’ll listen to everything we have to tell them about Jewel?” Fire asks.

  I shrug I don’t know, watching the world outside the car window. “We’re just kids, and you know how adults are about that. They think we have ‘overactive imaginations.’”

  Fire snorts. “We don’t have ‘imaginations,’” she says, crooking her fingers around the word imagination, “we have facts.”

  I hope she’s right.

  At the front desk in the hospital, Mrs. B announces our arrival to a lady staring at her computer screen. “We are here to visit a patient, Jewel Knight.”

  The lady looks up from her computer and frowns. She peers past Mrs. B, taking in Ree and the rest of us. “All of you?” she asks.

  “Yes, ma’am,” I say. “We’re all her friends.”

  “That may be,” the lady says, “but only two visitors are allowed at one time.”

  I feel Ree tense up next to me. Ree does not take comfort in rules.

  She takes one step forward. “She needs her friends,” she growls.

  “Those are the rules,” the lady growls back, which is, frankly, pretty impressive.

  “Ree,” Mama says, “why don’t you and Piper go on up and see Jewel, since she knows you. We’ll stay here.”

  “I want to go too!” Fire stomps her foot. Sometimes I forget how young she is.

  Mama cups Fire’s face in her hand. “I need you to stay here with us, honey. We need to do what’s best for Jewel right now.”

  I fiddle with the visitor’s pass hanging around my neck as we ride the elevator up to the third floor. What will Jewel be like? Despite what Mama said, Jewel doesn’t really know me. I talked with her that one time in line, but, well, she was kind of odd that day. I don’t know if she’d remember.

  On the third floor, we stop off at the nurses station to ask for directions to Jewel’s room. The nurse frowns. “The patient gets easily agitated.” She gives us the once-over. To Ree, she says, “You must keep your visit calm and brief.” You can tell she doesn’t think Ree has ever done anything calm in her life.

  I touch Ree’s arm and pull her away from the nurse before she can say anything back. “Yes, ma’am,” I assure the nurse as we walk away. “Calm and brief.”

  Ree stops in front of room 102. She looks down at me, raises one eyebrow, and pushes the door open.

  Jewel seems a lot smaller in the bed than I remember. Without the flowered dress, she looks all washed out.

  “Hey, Jewel,” Ree says softly, touching her friend’s hand.

  Jewel’s eyes flutter open. Her gaze swims around the room until they come to rest on Ree’s face. “Oh,” she says. “Is it really you or am I just dreaming it’s you?”

  Ree smiles and squeezes her hand. “It’s really me.” She motions me over. “And this is my friend, Piper.”

  Jewel’s faded blue eyes search my face. “Piper,” she repeats. “What a lovely name.”

  “Thank you,” I say. I want to tell her all about taking care of Baby and where he is now and how I promised him I’d find a way to get him back with her, and that I never break my promises, ever, but my tongue is as stiff and dry and useless as a dead fish.

  “Piper helped me take care of Baby after you came to the hospital, Jewel,” Ree explains. “And she’s doing everything she can to help you and Baby be together again.”

  Jewel’s eyes widen and fill with tears. “Baby!” she cries. “Where’s my Baby?” She sits up taller in her bed and rakes her fingers through her silver hair. “I keep asking and asking everyone, ‘Where is my Baby?’ and they won’t tell me. They won’t tell me anything,” she sobs.

  Ree slips her arm around the old woman’s shoulder and says in the tenderest voice, “Baby’s okay, Jewel. He’s in a safe place being taken care of.” She shoots me a look that says, don’t say a thing. “Now we have to make sure you’ll be okay too.”

  My tongue gets unstuck and rises from the dead. “Miss Knight,” I ask. “Were you on your way to see your sister when you, um, stopped here?”

  Jewel’s eyes dart around the room. “Sis? Is she here?” Before we can answer, she pushes the blankets off her legs and starts to get up. A machine beeps. “I have to find Sis!” she insists. “She’s waiting for me!” The beeping gets louder.

  The door to Jewel’s room swings open. It’s the nurse, and she doesn’t look too happy.

  “You need to leave,” the nurse says.

  “But we just got here,” I protest.

  “We need to calm the patient down,” she says.

  Ree’s eyes narrow in a dangerous glare. “What are you going to do to her?” She looks like she’s going to explode.

  This is not going well.

  “Ree,” I say, pulling on Ree’s arm. “Let’s go. We’ll come back again soon.”

  Ree yanks her arm away. “Don’t touch me,” she growls.

  “You need to leave, now,” the nurse says again, “or I’ll call security.”

  “Don’t leave me here,” Jewel whimpers.

  You can see the war inside Ree’s heart in her eyes. Finally, she touches Jewel’s hand. “We’ll be back soon,” she says. “I promise.”

  Ree turns and shoves past the nurse. I start to follow her out, but then I stop. I don’t know what in the world gets into me—maybe Fire, maybe Mama—but I turn and say in my most dignified voice, “Her name is Jewel,” I say. “Jewel Knight. She’s not ‘the patient,’ she’s a person.”

  Mama and Fire are working a puzzle in one of Mama’s sudoku books when we get back down to the lobby. Mrs. Bailey is on her phone.

  Fire jumps up when she sees us. “What happened? Did you tell the doctors about Jewel’s medicine?”

  My heart drops. The pill bottles. Ree, and I look at each other. How could we have forgotten?

  I look away. “We didn’t really have a chance to tell anyone. Things got a little, well”—I look at Mama—“tense up there. The nurse made us leave.”

  Ree studies her boots, frowning.

  “I cannot believe y’all didn’t tell that nurse about the pills!” Fire says.

  “Jewel did get pretty upset and, well, confused,” I say. “Maybe it was best that we left.”

  Mrs. B tucks her phone in her back pocket. “We’ll come back next week, when I have a day off.”

  “Next week?” Fire explodes. “The longer she doesn’t have her pills, the worse she’s going to get!”

  I feel tears stinging my eyes. “In a week, Baby might be adopted by someone else,” I whisper.

  A calm voice says, “Give me the pill bottles, honey.”

  Mama’s holding out her hand. I press the orange bottles in her palm. She drops them in her pocket and nods toward the elevator. “Let’s get this straightened out, Piper.”

  My heart flies up to the ceiling. If anybody can get this straightened out, my mama can.

  When we get back up to the nurses station, Mama puts on her best no-nonsense smile and asks, “Who’s in charge here?”

  The mean nurse raises her chin. “I am.”

  Mama glances at her name tag. “Ms. Dillard, my daughter and I are friends of Miss Jewel Knight, a patient here.” Mama takes the pill bottles out of her pocket. “And we need to talk with her doctor about medication she needs.”

  The nurse frowns at the orange bottles. “How do you happen to have the patient’s medication?”

  Mama nods at me.

  I look from Mama to the nurse. “It’s kind of a long story,” I say.

  The nurse, Ms. Dillard, crosses her arms over her chest. “I’m all ears.”

  I give the nurse the shortest version of Jewel and Baby’s story I possibly can. Let me tell you, it’s not easy.

  When I’m finished, Mama turns back to Ms. Dillard. “Could you please contact Miss Knight’s doctor and explain the situation?”

  The nurse’s puckered mouth softens. “I had no idea about Miss Knight’s sit
uation,” she says. She picks up the phone. “Her primary physician is Dr. Wells. I think she’s working today.”

  While we wait for Dr. Wells, Mama asks, “Do you know if Miss Knight has been assigned a caseworker?” I remember some of the people at the nursing home where Mama worked had caseworkers. Some were good, some were, as Mama said, as useless as a bicycle is for a fish.

  The nurse frowns. “She should have been, given her, um, living situation.” She flips through Jewel’s file. She shakes her head. “Doesn’t look like it, though.” She taps her pencil on the counter. She types something into the computer. “Let me call a friend of mine at Human Services.”

  Before you know it, the nurses station is filled with talking. Mama talking on the phone with Mrs. B downstairs. The nurse talking to Dr. Wells and a pretty lady named Samantha Madison. And then they’re all talking to each other and across from each other, only getting bits and pieces of Jewel’s story right. And none of Baby’s story.

  I pull on Mama’s sleeve. “Jewel and Baby’s story together is what’s important.”

  Mama nods. “Excuse me, y’all,” Mama says in a loud voice.

  Everybody stops talking.

  “If we’re really going to help Jewel, you need to know the whole story.”

  Mama pulls me to her. “My daughter here, Piper, is the one who knows more than anybody about Miss Knight.”

  Dr. Wells nods. “Go on, Piper.”

  Oh Lord. I take a deep breath and tell them the story of Baby and Jewel.

  I tell about meeting her in line at the Sixth Street Community Kitchen and falling in love with Baby. Mama’s face turns a little bit pink when I say we were standing in a food line to eat. Mine does too, but I have to tell it straight.

  I tell about Jewel getting sick and being taken away from Baby. I tell about Ree giving the duffel bag to Daddy for safekeeping and finding the two books and the key.

  I tell about how me and my friends figured out she and Baby lived in Lexington, Kentucky, and the silver key, and the black suitcase, how the suitcase had the postcards, photographs, and medicine bottles in it.

  Dr. Wells nods, looking at the labels on the bottles. “We knew Miss Knight had some, shall we say, psychological issues, but the medication we’ve been giving her hasn’t helped. This information,” she says, smiling for the first time, “will make all the difference.”

  Then I tell about the postcards, how Jewel was traveling across the country east to west to someone named Sis at Heartwell Manor, and how me and Karina and Daria figured out that Sis—who is Jewel’s sister—lives at the Heartwell Manor in Idaho. “But we don’t know what her sister’s name is because it might not be Knight.”