Handle With Care

by Jodi Picoult

  'Nope, just some collagen,' you said, and I almost cracked a smile.

  A moment later, I heard the bathroom door lock. Scrupulous, devout, annihilate. Lethargic, lethal, subside. The world would be a much easier place if, instead of handing over superstuffed syllables all the time, we just said what we really meant. Words got in the way. The things we felt the hardest - like what it was like to have a boy touch you as if you were made of light, or what it meant to be the only person in the room who wasn't noticed - weren't sentences; they were knots in the wood of our bodies, places where our blood flowed backward. If you asked me, not that anyone ever did, the only words worth saying were I'm sorry.

  I made it through Lesson 13 and Lesson 14 - devious, aghast, rustic - and glanced down at my watch. It was only three o'clock. 'Wiki,' I said, 'what time did Mom say she'd be home--' And then I remembered you weren't there.

  You hadn't been, for a good fifteen or twenty minutes.

  No one had to go to the bathroom that long.

  My pulse started racing. Had I been so engrossed in learning the definition of arbitration that I hadn't heard a telltale fall? I ran to the bathroom door and rattled the knob. 'Willow? Are you okay?'

  There was no answer.

  Sometimes I wonder what really constitutes an emergency.

  I lifted up my leg and used my foot to break down the door.

  Sean

  T

  he soup that came out of the vending machine at the courthouse looked - and tasted - just like the coffee. It was my third cup today, and I still wasn't quite sure what I was drinking.

  I was sitting near the window of my hiding place - my biggest accomplishment on this, the second day of the trial. I had planned to sit in the lobby until Guy Booker needed me - but I hadn't counted on the press. The ones who hadn't squeezed into the courtroom figured out who I was quickly enough and swarmed, leaving me to back away muttering No comment.

  I'd poked through the maze of the courthouse corridors, trying doorknobs until I found one that opened. I had no idea what this room was used for normally, but it was located almost directly above the courtroom where Charlotte was right now.

  I didn't really believe in ESP or any of that crap, but I hoped she could feel me up here. Even more, I hoped that was a good thing.

  Here was my secret: in spite of the fact that I had defected to the other side, in spite of the fact that my marriage had crashed on the rocks, there was a part of me that wondered what would happen if Charlotte won.

  With enough money, we could send you to a camp this summer, so that you could meet other kids like you.

  With enough money, we could buy a new van, instead of repairing the one that was seven years old with spit and glue.

  With enough money, we could pay off our credit card debt and the second mortgage we'd taken out after the health insurance bills escalated.

  With enough money, I could take Charlotte away for a night and fall in love with her again.

  I truly believed that the cost of success for us shouldn't be the cost of failure for a good friend. But what if we hadn't known Piper personally, only professionally? Would I have endorsed a case like that against a different doctor? Was it Piper's involvement I objected to - or the whole lawsuit?

  There were so many things we hadn't been told: How it feels when a rib breaks, when I'm doing nothing more than cradling you.

  How much it hurts to see the look on your face when you watch your older sister skating.

  How even the people in a position to help have to cause pain first: the doctors who reset your bones, the folks who mold your leg braces by letting you play in them and get blisters, so that they know what to fix.

  How your bones were not the only things that would break. There would be hairline cracks we would not see for years in my finances, my future, my marriage.

  Suddenly I wanted to hear your voice. I took out my cell phone and started to dial, only to hear a loud beep as the battery died. I stared down at the receiver. I could go out to the car and get the charger, but that would mean running the gauntlet again. While I was weighing the costs and the benefits, the door to my sanctuary opened, and a slice of noise from the hallway slipped inside, followed by Piper Reece.

  'You'll have to find your own hiding place,' I said, and she jumped.

  'You scared me to death,' Piper said. 'How did you know that's what I was doing?'

  'Because it's why I'm here. Shouldn't you be in court?'

  'We took a recess.'

  I hesitated, then figured I had nothing to lose. 'How's it going in there?'

  Piper opened her mouth, as if she were going to reply, and then shut it. 'I'll let you get back to your phone call,' she murmured, her hand on the doorknob.

  'It's dead,' I said, and she turned around. 'My phone.'

  She folded her arms. 'Remember when there were no cell phones? When we didn't have to listen to everyone's conversations?'

  'Some things are better left private,' I said.

  Piper met my gaze. 'It's awful in there,' she admitted. 'The last witness was an actuary who gave estimates on the out-of-pocket cost for Willow's care, and the grand total, based on her life expectancy.'

  'What did he say?'

  'Thirty thousand annually.'

  'No,' I said. 'I meant, how long will she live?'

  Piper hesitated. 'I don't like thinking of Willow in terms of numbers. Like she's already a statistic.'

  'Piper.'

  'There's no reason she won't have a normal life expectancy,' Piper said.

  'But not a normal life,' I finished.

  Piper leaned against the wall. I had not turned the lights on - I didn't want anyone to know I was in here, after all - and in the shadows her face looked lined and tired. 'Last night I dreamed about the first time we had you over for dinner - to meet Charlotte.'

  I could recall that night like it was yesterday. I had gotten lost on the way to Piper's house because I was so nervous. For obvious reasons, I'd never before been invited to someone's house after giving her a speeding ticket; and I wouldn't have gone at all, but the day before pulling Piper's car over for doing fifty in a thirty-mile-an-hour zone, I'd gone to the house of my best friend - another cop - and found my girlfriend in his bed. I had nothing to lose when Piper called the department a week later and asked; it was impulsive and stupid and desperate.

  When I got to Piper's, and was introduced to Charlotte, she'd held out her hand for me to shake and a spark had caught between our palms, shocking us both. The two little girls had eaten in the living room while the adults sat at the table; Piper had just served me a slice of caramel-pecan torte that Charlotte had made. 'What do you think?' Charlotte had asked.

  The filling was still warm and sweet; crust dissolved on my tongue like a memory. 'I think we should get married,' I said, and everyone laughed, but I was not entirely kidding.

  We had been talking about our first kisses. Piper told a story about a boy who'd enticed her into the woods behind the jungle gym on the pretext that there was a unicorn behind an ash tree; Rob talked about being paid five bucks by a seventh-grade girl for a practice run. Charlotte hadn't been kissed, it turned out, till she was eighteen. 'I can't believe that,' I said.

  'What about you, Sean?' Rob asked.

  'I can't remember.' By then, I had lost sense of everything but Charlotte. I could have told you how many inches away from my leg hers was beneath the table. I could have told you how the curls of her hair caught the candlelight and held on to it. I could not remember my first kiss, but I could have told you Charlotte would be my last.

  'Remember how we had Amelia and Emma in the living room,' Piper said now. 'We were having such a good time no one thought to check on them?'

  Suddenly I could see it - all of us crowded into the tiny downstairs bathroom, Rob yelling at his daughter, who had commandeered Amelia into helping her dump dry dog food into the toilet bowl.

  Piper started to laugh. 'Emma kept saying it was only a cupful.' />
  But it had soaked up the water and swollen to fill the bowl. It was amazing, in fact, how quickly it had gotten out of control.

  Beside me, Piper's laughter had turned the corner, and in that way emotion has of hopping boundaries, she was suddenly crying. 'God, Sean. How did we get here?'

  I stood awkwardly, and then after a moment I slipped an arm around her. 'It's okay.'

  'No, it's not,' Piper sobbed, and she buried her face against my shoulder. 'I have never, ever in my life been the bad guy. But every time I walk into that courtroom, that's exactly what I am.'

  I had hugged Piper Reece before. It was what married couples did - you went to someone's house and you handed over the obligatory bottle of wine and kissed the hostess on the cheek. Maybe distantly I was aware that Piper was taller than Charlotte, that she smelled of an unfamiliar perfume instead of Charlotte's pear soap and vanilla extract. At any rate, the embrace was triangular: you connected at the cheek, and then your bodies angled away from each other.

  But right now Piper was pressed against me, her tears hot against my neck. I could feel the curve and weight of her body. And I could tell the exact moment she became aware of mine.

  And then she was kissing me, or maybe I was kissing her, and she tasted of cherries, and my eyes closed, and the moment they did, all I could see was Charlotte.

  We both pushed away from each other, our eyes averted. Piper pressed her hands to her cheeks. I have never, ever in my life been the bad guy, she had said.

  There is a first time for everything.

  'I'm sorry,' I said, at the same time Piper began to speak.

  'I shouldn't have--'

  'It didn't happen,' I interrupted. 'Let's just say it didn't happen, all right?'

  Piper looked up at me sadly. 'Just because you don't want to see something, Sean, doesn't mean it wasn't there.'

  I didn't know if we were talking about this moment, or this lawsuit, or both. There were a thousand things I wanted to say to Piper, all of which began and ended with an apology, but what tumbled off my lips instead was this: 'I love Charlotte,' I said. 'I love my wife.'

  'I know,' Piper whispered, 'I did, too.'

  Charlotte

  T

  he movie that had been filmed to show a day in your life was the last bit of evidence that Marin would offer to the jury. It was the emotional counterpart to the cold, hard facts the actuary had given, about what it costs in this country to have a disabled child. It felt like ages since the video crew had followed you around school, and to be honest, I had worried about the outcome. What if the jury looked at our daily routine and didn't find it remarkably different from anyone else's?

  Marin had told me that it was her job to make sure the presentation came off in our favor, and as soon as the first images projected onto the courtroom screen, I realized I should not have worried. Editing is a marvelous thing.

  It began with an image of your face, reflected in the windowpane you were peering through. You weren't speaking, but you didn't have to. There was a lifetime of longing in your eyes.

  The view panned out the window, then, to watch your sister skating on the pond.

  Then came the first few strains of a song as I knelt down to strap on your braces before school, because you could not reach them yourself. After a moment I recognized it: 'I Hope You Dance.'

  In the pocket of my jacket, my cell phone began to vibrate.

  We were not allowed to have cell phones on in court, but I'd told Marin that I had to be reachable, just in case - and we'd compromised with this. I slipped my hand into my pocket and looked at the screen to see who was calling.

  HOME, it read.

  On the projector screen, you were in class, and kids were funneling around you like a school of fish, doing some kind of spider dance at circle time, while you sat immobile in your wheelchair.

  'Marin,' I whispered.

  'Not now.'

  'Marin, my phone's ringing--'

  She leaned closer to me. 'If you pick up that phone right now instead of watching this film, the jury will crucify you for being heartless.'

  So I sat on my hands, getting more and more agitated. Maybe the jury thought it was because I couldn't watch this. The phone would stop vibrating and then start a moment later. On the screen I watched you at physical therapy, walking forward toward the mat biting your lower lip. The phone vibrated again, and I made a small sound in the back of my throat.

  What if you'd fallen? What if the nurse didn't know what to do? What if it was something even worse than a simple break?

  I could hear snuffling sounds behind me, purses being opened and rummaged through for Kleenex. I could see the jury riveted by your words, your elfin face.

  The phone buzzed again, an electrical shock to my system. This time I slipped it out of my pocket to see the text message icon. I hid the receiver under the table and flipped it open.

  WILLOW HURT - HELP

  'I have to get out of here,' I whispered to Marin.

  'In fifteen minutes . . . We absolutely cannot recess right now.'

  I looked up at the screen again, my heart hammering. Hurt, how? Why wasn't the nurse doing something?

  You were sitting on the mat, your legs frogged. Above you a red ring dangled. You winced as you reached for it. Can we stop now?

  Come on, Willow, I know you're tougher than that . . . wrap your fingers around and give it a squeeze.

  You tried, for Molly. But tears were streaming from your eyes, and the sound that came from you was a sharp, staccato burst. Please, Molly . . . can I stop?

  The phone was vibrating again. I wrapped my hand around it.

  And then I was on the mat with you, holding you in my arms, rocking you, and telling you that I would make it better.

  If I had been more aware of what was happening in the courtroom, I would have noticed that every woman on the jury was crying, and some of the men. I would have seen the TV cameras in the back of the gallery that were recording for playback on that night's news. I would have seen Judge Gellar close his eyes and shake his head. But instead, the moment the screen went to black, I bolted.

  I could feel everyone watching me as I ran up the aisle and out the double doors, and they probably thought I was overcome with emotion or too fragile to look at you in Technicolor. The moment I shoved past the bailiffs I hit the redial button on my phone. 'Amelia? What's the matter?'

  'She's bleeding,' Amelia sobbed, hysterical. 'There was blood all over the place and she wasn't moving and--'

  Suddenly, an unfamiliar voice was on the phone. 'Is this Mrs O'Keefe?'

  'Yes?'

  'I'm Hal Chen, one of the EMTs who--'

  'What's wrong with my daughter!'

  'She's lost a great deal of blood, that's all we know right now. Can you meet us at Portsmouth Regional?'

  I don't know if I even said yes. I didn't try to tell Marin. I just ran - across the lobby, out the courthouse doors. I pushed past the reporters, who were caught unawares, who pulled themselves together just in time to focus their cameras and point their microphones at the woman who was sprinting away from this trial, headed toward you.

  Amelia

  W

  hen I had been really little and the wind blew like mad at night, I had trouble sleeping. My father would come in and tell me that the house wasn't made of straw or sticks, that it was brick, and like the little pigs knew, nothing could tear it down. Here's what the little pigs didn't realize: the big bad wolf was only the start of their problems. The biggest threat was already inside the house with them, and couldn't be seen. Not radon gas or carbon monoxide, but just the way three very different personalities fit inside one small space. Tell me that the slacker pig - the one who only mustered up straw - really could get along with the high-maintenance bricklayer pig. I think not. I'll bet you if that fairy tale went on another ten pages, all three of those pigs would have been at each other's throats, and that brick house would have exploded after all.

  When I broke dow
n the door of the bathroom with my ninja kick, it gave more easily than I expected, but then again, the house was old and the jamb just splintered. You were in plain sight, but I didn't see you. How could I, with all that blood everywhere?

  I started to scream, and then I ran into the bathroom and grabbed your cheeks. 'Willow, wake up. Wake up!'

  It didn't work, but your arm jostled, and out of your hand fell my razor blade.

  My heart started to race. You'd seen me cutting the other night; I'd been so angry, I couldn't remember if I'd hidden the blade back in its usual hiding place. What if you had been copying what you'd seen?

  It meant this was all my fault.

  There were cuts on your wrist. By now, I was hysterical crying. I didn't know if I should wrap a towel around you and try to stop the bleeding or call an ambulance or call my mother.

  I did all three.

  When the firemen came with the ambulance, they raced upstairs, their boots muddy on the carpet. 'Be careful,' I cried, hovering in the doorway of the bathroom. 'She's got this brittle bone disease. She'll break if you move her.'

  'She'll bleed out if we don't,' one of the firemen muttered.

  One of the EMTs stood up, blocking my view. 'Tell me what happened.'

  I was crying so hard that my eyes had nearly swollen shut. 'I don't know. I was studying in my room. There was a nurse, but she went home. And Willow-- And she--' My nose was streaming, my words curdled. 'She was in the bathroom for a really long time.'

  'How long?' the fireman asked.

  'Maybe ten minutes . . . five?'

  'Which one?'

  'I don't know,' I sobbed. 'I don't know.'

  'Where did she get the razor blade?' the fireman asked.

  I swallowed hard and forced myself to meet his gaze. 'I have no idea,' I lied.

  Buckle: a cake made in one layer with berries in the batter.

  When you don't have what you want, you have to want what you have. It's one of the first lessons the colonists learned when they came to America and found that they couldn't make the trifles and steamed puddings they'd loved in England because the ingredients didn't exist here. That discovery led to a rash of innovation, in which settlers used seasonal fruits and berries to make quick dishes that were served for breakfast or even a main course. They came with names like buckle and grunt, crumble and cobbler and crisp, brown Betty, sonker, slump, and pandowdy. There have been whole books written on the origins of these names - grunt is the sound of the fruit cooking; Louisa May Alcott affectionately called her family home in Concord, Massachusetts, 'Apple Slump' - but some of the strange titles have never been explained.