Catching Serenity (Serenity #4)

by Eden Butler

Rhea sits up in her bed, fussing with the mask covering her nose and mouth to get a better look at the article on the laptop screen and the image accompanying it.

  “You don’t?” My little cousin glances at me like I am simple. It’s her customary ‘you’re a dumb adult’ look obscured only by that paper mask. But I know this kid. I know her expressions better than my own. There is only a pause and then she returns her attention to the article, moving her head to the right as though that would help her form a final opinion. “Why not?” I ask her, pushing the screen back with my thumb as I nestle closer to her.

  “It’s just stupid. They call Thor, Thor. Just Thor. Not ‘Thor, God of Thunder.’”

  “They do so.”

  When she gets flustered, mildly worked up, her eyebrows move and the smallest hint of her skin brightening makes her cheeks pink. She does this now, and I’m not sure if it’s from her irritation at my teasing or the mild infection that has her skin clammy.

  “They don’t,” she says, wiggling up the mattress to turn her body toward me. “I mean like in regular chats. You think Jane says ‘Oh, Thor, God of Thunder, grab me a lemonade while you’re in the kitchen.’ She just says, ‘Hey, hot stuff’ or ‘Yo.’”

  “Hey hot stuff?” She nods, eyebrows pinched together above that pale green mask. “So… no one says ‘hot stuff’ anymore. Where’d you hear that?”

  A small shrug as though she’s already moved on, and she slips back down against the pillows. “Dad was watching ‘The Dukes of Hazard’ again last night while Mama was out at the store.”

  She’s already forgotten her point, scanning the article again. To look at her, anyone would think she was a normal, albeit thin eight-year-old. She is far smarter than she should be, but Rhea has spent most of her brief life reading books and comics while stuck in the isolation of her bedroom or, on the occasions that her platelets were too low or some weird infection took hold of her, at the pediatric ward at Cavanagh Regional Hospital. Marvel.com might be a little above her reading level, but no one can lecture the kid on being a kid. Not when she’s always been expected to tackle the cards dealt her like a war weary solider.

  “Well, don’t say ‘hot stuff.’” She offers me only the slightest eye roll and giggle when I give her elbow a soft nudge. “It’s not the 70’s.”

  “What should I say?”

  “Nothing. You should read your comics and watch Firefly.”

  Her fingernails are thin, barely covering the tips of her fingers when she waves her hand, telling me with one small gesture that she doesn’t need me lecturing her. “I’m not a baby, you know.”

  “Of course you’re not. But you have plenty of time for ‘hot stuff’ and ‘yo.’” When those eyebrows lower further, I shoot a quick glare at her, already knowing why some of the shine in those dark eyes has dimmed. “Don’t give me that. You’re doing fine.”

  “Two more rounds of chemo and I’m done.” She moves deeper into her pillow, forgetting the small challenge I level, the one she hasn’t been too eager to take lately. “Again.”

  I don’t like this negative attitude. It’s understandable, it’s expected, but Rhea thinking even remotely that she won’t win this battle goes against everything I know of my cousin. It’s simply not who she’s ever been.

  “Hey,” I tell her, setting the laptop on the foot of the bed. “What did I tell you about grumpiness?”

  Most kids her age would pout, protruding bottom lip and all. But Rhea isn’t most kids. She hasn’t been afforded that luxury. “That it’s useless.”

  “That’s right and why?”

  When I continue to stare, waiting for her response, the kid shakes her head. Crossing her arms is as close to a pout as Rhea will get. “Because all it does is send bad juju out into the world.” When I nod, that head shake doubles. “Claire said the catechism teacher told her that there was no such thing as juju or making things real just by speaking them out loud.”

  “Yeah well, Claire’s catechism teacher is Mollie Reynolds.” It’s nearly impossible to keep the affected tone from my voice. Mollie Reynolds was an idiot and a huge gossip in high school. “I went to school with her. Trust me, she’s a big dummy.” A small laugh bursts from her that she tries to conceal behind her thin fingers, despite the mask. I go in for the double kill to keep her laughter loud. “She doesn’t even have a library card. I checked.” That was the highest offense anyone could commit in Rhea’s book, and the tidbit worked. My cousin’s eyes widened as though she couldn’t believe anyone would do without access to the library.

  Mollie Reynolds and her post-high school recovery is easily forgotten as Rhea sits up again, pulling a small stack of comics I bought her a few days back—the covers already smudged from multiple readings—onto her lap.

  “So, what can I bring you back from Autumn’s?”

  “Declan.” The kid isn’t remotely ashamed of herself. Since Declan came into our lives two years ago, Rhea’s been very blatant about her mild crush, as most kids are. She sees no reason to fake offense when I or Autumn tease her about her love for the stubborn Irishman.

  “Goofball, he’ll be jetlagged.”

  “He owes me a rugby lesson.” Rhea tosses two Firefly comics at her feet and I grab one, flipping through the colorful pages while she copies my motion with another Dark Horse comic I can’t quite make out.

  “He’ll get around to it, you know that,” I tell her, keeping my voice even. It would be pointless to tell her the same thing my aunt and uncle have been saying for months now. Rhea knows everything she wants to do, especially anything athletic, will get pushed aside until after her treatment. “Declan doesn’t welch on his promises.”

  “I can play, you know.” She pauses only for a second, glancing in my direction before she grabs another comic and I make a mental note to stop by Marty’s to check out the new arrivals.

  “I have zero doubt about that.”

  It’s the small moments like this one, chatting with Rhea, not really saying anything that we haven’t gone over a hundred times, that are the sharpest and clearest in my mind. But then when the future is as uncertain as hers, it’s these moments that are the most comforting.

  Plenty of amazing things come in life. There are some moments that are brought into focus first because they are so monumental. But it is the mundane, the modest pleasures from our lives that matter the most because they remind us that even the simplest of lives can be extraordinary. With my little cousin sitting next to me, I realize how beautiful unexceptional moments really are.

  That’s why I make a point to spend some time with Rhea every day. The few hours I am with her, sitting and chatting about comics or books or television shows, or the very important topic of Declan Fraser—who Rhea is convinced she’s going to marry one day—reminds my cousin that her life can be normal. It is not all doctors and appointments and the medicine that wears her down. This time together, just the two of us, reminds her of what a normal life is and how remarkable she is to live in it.

  She has stopped reading the comic and a glance at her face tells me she’s wondering something but still taking a moment to figure out how to ask about it. It’s her way, being thoughtful, and it’s how she usually gets the straightforward answers she’s seeking. This is no typical eight-year-old. There is a very old soul peeking behind those big, dark eyes and that tiny frame.

  Her small fingers drum across the shiny cover of her comic before she stops to glance at me. “Do you think Autumn will marry Declan one day?”

  It’s not the first time she’s asked this. It won’t be the last, and sometimes I think Rhea believes she’ll pull a different response from me if she keeps at it. But Autumn is my best friend, and Declan started proposing to her months after they began dating. There’s no way an altar isn’t in their future. “Sorry, kiddo.” Even with the mask, I pick up her frown as the comic in my hands hits my lap. “That’s pretty much a guarantee.”

  “Oh.”

  She’s too young for wrinkles, but I�
�ve noticed the faintest lines creasing in the center of her forehead lately. Worry, stress, they are a part of all our lives now. I should be used to seeing the same expression in the mirror on my Aunt Carol’s face. Still, no matter how used to that frown I get, I don’t have to like it.

  “He has a brother, you know.” I can see her cheeks pushing up her lower eyelids under the mask. “And, he’s younger.”

  “How much younger?” Rhea’s squint is forced, a little over exaggerated.

  “Still too old for you.”

  A quick raspberry in my direction and she picks up her comic again. “You’re no fun.”

  “Oh? So I can take these back to Marty’s?” I reach for the pile of comics—some old school Gen 13, some issues of Buffy the Vampire Slayer that her illness and its various treatments had kept her from reading regularly. She’d devoured them after only a couple of days of returning home from the hospital, and already they looked old and well loved.

  “No, don’t do that.” When I don’t move my hand from the top of the stack, Rhea tilts her head, pleading a little with one look as though that will have any impact on me.

  It totally does.

  “Fine, but don’t be insulting.”

  “I guess you’re kinda fun.”

  The tease works and we laugh, but then the laugh turns into a small cough which turns into a hack, and Rhea sits up, tears off her mask to cup her hands over her mouth, curving her back as the coughing increases.

  “Careful,” I say, rubbing her back while the phlegm and mucus breaks loose in her chest. “I don’t like the sound of that. You need a breathing treatment.” But when I make to leave, Rhea grabs my wrist, head shaking frantically as the last of a wheeze keeps her silent. “What?”

  “Not yet, okay?” She inhales, hand on her small chest. “Wait for a little bit.”

  “Why?”

  “Just wait until you leave for the barbeque.” She blinks, rubs away the moisture on her eyelashes before she smiles. “Just a little bit longer.” There is a small whoosh of air that rumbles the pillow when she leans back against it, keeping her palm over her heart.

  The coughing worries me. It takes Rhea longer to get over illnesses, with the cancer and chemo weakening her immune system. The bronchitis she had months ago has left a lingering cough, one that requires breathing treatments when the hacking gets too bad. I hate seeing her suffer. I hate feeling useless. “Maybe I should stay, skip the barbeque.”

  “No. It’s stupid here.” She barely lifts her hand from her chest and waves, dismissing my argument before I’ve had a chance to make a good point. “Why should you be stuck here too?”

  “Rhea…”

  She shuts me up with a shake of her head. “I want you to go so you can remind Declan about my lesson.”

  Three comics and a box of Kleenex fall to the floor when I reach for a fresh mask for her from the side table. “You just want him to bring your UK chocolate.”

  “It’s so sweet.” Rhea’s voice is still a bit raspy, the words broken when she speaks, but she seems calmer, even helps me slip the white elastic straps of the mask behind her ears. I don’t let her see my frown when even that simple action leaves some of her hair between my fingers.

  “Yeah, I know.” This most recent treatment is making her hair fall out. It hadn’t grown out much since the last round of chemo, but in the past year things had gone well. It had been the longest time since she was diagnosed four years ago that she’d gone so long without the cancerous masses returning. Now her hair came to just below her ears and there were thin spots around the crown. She catches me looking over her scalp and frowns.

  “I’m going to shave it.”

  “Then I will too.” I don’t hesitate, shrugging like the concept is no big deal.

  “No. That’s dumb. You have all that pretty pink hair.” Rhea grabs the ends of my hair, curling a wave around her fingers. “Why would you shave it?”

  “So we match.”

  She releases my hair and rests again against the pillow. “We match enough.”

  “If I shave my head then we’ll be twins.”

  “You’re just saying that because we’re the only ones in the family who look the same.”

  It’s true. Between my parents’ rainbow coalition of adopted children—Asian (me), black (my twin brothers, Booker and Carver), Cuban (my sister, Adriana) and Guatemalan (my sister, Alessandra), and Rhea’s folks’ adopted child, Rhea, and their natural daughter Claire, our family is a weird little ethnic anomaly. Eighty percent of Cavanagh’s residents are Irish, including my parents and Rhea’s. So our diverse family make up has us standing out. Eight years ago when my Aunt Carol brought Rhea home, I instantly gravitated toward her.

  “She comes from Shirakawa-go, Sayo. Just like you. You might even be related.”

  I hadn’t cared if we were. I hadn’t cared if she was Japanese or Bulgarian or lily white like my aunt and uncle and my parents. I only knew that little Rhea was the most beautiful baby I’d ever seen and a sudden, blinding need to protect her, to guard her from the world fell upon me. I was still a kid myself, no more than seventeen, and had no clue where I was headed in life. I only knew that this baby was a shadow of my younger self. Maybe she was the echo I left behind in Japan.

  Then came the news four years ago, when Rhea had already taught herself to read, when the prospect of day school and Pre-K had the girl twirling around my aunt’s den dizzy with excitement: Aunt Carol had spotted a deviation in her Rhea’s left eye. Then came the MRI, more exams and the discovery of a brain tumor along the optic nerve. Bilateral optic glioma, inoperable. Chemo, low white blood cell counts, and low platelet measurements, have become commonplace in our lives since then. When the platelets are very low, Rhea is sequestered in her room and everything must be sterilized. When they are very bad, with no sign of improving, she lands back in the hospital.

  “I don’t want you to shave it.” Her voice is quieter now and I adjust her pillows, fluffing them before I rest on my shoulder at her side. Again she picks up one of my pink waves and runs her fingers through the end. “I want to color mine when it starts to come back again.”

  “What color? Pink?” I tug on a fallen strand of my pink hair from the pillow next to Rhea’s head. I should have already gone in for another re-dye, but Rhea’s latest relapse had kept me from most all activities that didn’t include sitting with her or taking her to appointments while my aunt and uncle worked to find funding for the experimental treatments the doctor’s wanted Rhea to try if the current treatments failed yet again.

  “No, not pink,” she says, stifling a yawn. “Pink is for you.”

  “Okay, so you want to do red? Maybe orange or green?”

  “Purple.” She dropped my hair, turning on her side to face me. “We’ll be twins but not identical.”

  “I like that.” Another cough begins, but isn’t as severe as the last one and she lets me hold her hand. I don’t like how cold her skin feels or the way she shrugs off the blanket when I pull it over her shoulder. “Let me get Aunt Carol. You need a treatment.”

  “Fine…” she finally says, but the word drops off in another rapid fire cough that has Rhea kicking the blankets from her legs and pointing to the metal bin on the floor.

  “You want her now?” I ask, handing het the bin as she rips off the mask to spit out the mess her coughing has produced.

  She gives me a sideways look full of irritation but doesn’t argue. “But then you have to go. I don’t want you to be late for the barbeque.”

  She wants to be alone, something Carol told me she’s been asking for a lot lately. The comics, the books, the debates on names of fictional characters just aren’t enough anymore. I’m scared nothing will be.

  “You want that lesson that bad?” I ask, wiping her mouth with a Kleenex.

  “I want that chocolate.”

  A NEW FALL semester in Cavanagh ushers in beginnings and endings—kids embarking on the start of their college experience, parents sub
jected to the deafening quiet in their homes where there had once been teenage noise and commotion. With September comes the lingering of summer, the only a hint that the tight grip Mother Nature seems to have on the heat will eventually give way to milder temperatures.

  The day has me baking and the six block trek to the house of my best friend’s father seems longer with the heat thickening the air. Still, I do enjoy the scenery. Our town is small, no more than 10,000 inhabitants. Residential areas meld effortlessly into the university campus, which in turn gives way to the older part of town that hosts retail shops, pubs and small cafes.

  Beyond that lies an even older section of town with smart little well-maintained Victorians and Craftsman, all at least seventy or eight years old. This is where Joe, Autumn’s father, lives. Beyond the fence line of his backyard, beyond the reach of this older residential street, are mountainous ranges that peek and stretch so tall that they disappear into the sky, dislodged from view by the billowing sweep of clouds.

  I never tire of seeing it in any part of town, but here in Joe’s neighborhood the view is the clearest. It’s here, at Joe’s, that Autumn chose to host a small barbeque for us to welcome her boyfriend, Declan, home properly from his two-week trip to Ireland, where he’d been sent to fetch his newly revealed half-brother, Quinn.

  Quinn, who was two years younger than Declan, had spent a big chunk of his deceased parents’ estate on drink and women. No, that made him sound like just a run of the mill bad boy. Quinn was out of control. The amount of drinking, drug use, and sleeping around was not only threatening his health and well-being, but was also becoming an increasing embarrassment. Autumn had shared with me horror stories from Declan about how his half-brother would go for days shit-faced drunk or drugged out of his mind, waking up in a bed where he didn’t even know the name of the girl—or girls—with him. The estate trustees wanted him out of the country and on the straight and narrow, and realizing that he had an older half-brother in the States apparently gave them the “out” they needed to make sure the estate didn’t get completely squandered. I myself had no idea why they thought Declan would be the right person for the job. He barely keeps up with the varsity rugby squad he captains and his final semester studies at Cavanagh University. But, Declan being Declan, went to Ireland to take care of this unearthed family business anyway.