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Swiping open the note from Jesse in PR, he read,Good job. Maybe send this to your lawyer.
He clicked on the attachment—a screenshot taken from Instagram. A picture of him and Abby at the park that morning, Gen’s leash wrapped around their legs, Abby’s head back, staring up at him with adoring eyes, him smiling down at her.
Whoever the photographer had been, they had tagged it#relationshipgoals. Laughing, Scott saved the picture, then forwarded the email to Mark.
Twenty-Eight
“HEY, CARA, WHAT’S up?”
Abby, juggling her jacket and keys, Gen’s leash, and the salad she’d prepared to take over to Scott’s place for dinner, pressed the phone between her ear and her shoulder.
Dylan had band rehearsal after school. He’d play first chair trumpet in the Christmas concert and he’d been up late every night for the last week practicing, working on his homework and end-of-semester projects, and hand-making holiday decorations, half of which went up at his house, the other half of which went home with Abby.
She’d made the mistake of mentioning she had only a small, fake tree and a single string of lights—neither of which she’d put up in years—and Dylan had taken it upon himself to remedy her obvious lack of holiday cheer.
Abby pressed down on one of the curling, wilted paper cutouts of holly Dylan had colored the night before, so saturated with dark green ink even the generous use of double-sided tape couldn’t keep it flat. Then, clicking her tongue for Gen, she held up her leash.
“Hey, Abby,” Cara paused, her voice breaking. “I think you and Gen should come in.”
“What happened?”
“It’s Liam...” Her words choked to a stop.
Abby didn’t need Cara to say anything more.
“We’re on our way.” She hung up and clicked her tongue again.
Gen, curled in her basket on the floor outside the kitchen, raised her head, then dropped it again.
“C’mon...” She swallowed hard, clearing the thickness she could hardly breathe past. “C’mon, Gen. Let’s go.”
The dog rose, shook, then padded across the floor, head low and ears pressed back, her tail drooping, and Abby knelt as she approached. Wrapping her arms around Gen, she pressed her face into the fuzzy, black ruff for a moment.
Breathe.
Twenty minutes later, Abby tapped her knuckles on the door to Liam’s room. His mother answered, jaw tight and eyes shimmering.
“Abby. Thank you for coming.”
“Of course.” Abby stepped into the room, bright from the harsh, fluorescent lights above.
The setting sun, bleeding brilliantly in orange and magenta across the sky, went unnoticed outside the window. Ethan laid in the bed beside his twin, still, for once, his hand resting on Liam’s chest as it rose and fell in sleep. A man sat on the bench beside the window. Liam’s dad.
She didn’t ask. Didn’t need to. Whatever had happened, it didn’t matter, now. Only the long, silent vigil remained as those in the room waited for minutes, or hours, until the tiny chest would rise no more.
Her eyes burned.
It never got easier, but this one... This one would hurt more than most.
She guided Gen to the bed, knowing this would be the last time she would set her hand to the dog’s collar, give her the command, and help her leap onto the sheets and settle herself beside Liam’s small form.
Ethan, alerted by the jingle of Gen’s collar, reached across his brother and rubbed Gen’s soft ear between his fingers. “Liam? Gen’s here.”
It lacked his usual exuberance, the triumphant announcement of a friend arriving to play. Quiet instead—subdued—little more than a whisper, as if Ethan didn’t know whether to let his brother sleep or wake him up to say hello.
Liam’s eyelids fluttered, then opened, looking out with an emptiness Abby recognized all too well. His tiny hand twitched beside him, and Abby guided it around Gen’s neck, pressing the dog’s head lightly into place on the boy’s chest.
Her tail thumped once, then stilled.