Page 14 of Everything All at Once

“Instructions for what?”

“So far just for little things, like—be happy, go to the party, eat a cupcake. Shit, I forgot to eat a cupcake.”

“Helen left you a letter telling you to eat a cupcake?”

“Don’t say it like that.”

“I’m sorry! I didn’t mean it.... I’m just processing. That must be so nice.”

“Nice?”

“To have them. It’s like she’s still here with you, you know?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I guess it is nice.”

“Oh! And!”

Em jumped out of bed, surprisingly spry for this late at night, this many white wine colas. She grabbed her overnight bag and fished around in it for a second and then pulled out a wad of napkins. She presented them to me, smiling widely. I carefully peeled back layer after layer until I got to a particularly squashed cupcake.

“You didn’t,” I said.

“I stole it,” she said, shrugging. “But now you can dowhat she wanted you to do!”

“You’re really amazing, do you know that?”

“I’ve heard.” She climbed back into bed, and I swear she was asleep in three and a half seconds.

I sat down at my desk and ate the cupcake slowly. It was really good, from my aunt’s favorite bakery. She always said it was all about the frosting; the frosting could make or break the cake. When I was done, I wiped my hands with the napkins and then threw them in the trash. And then I found the fourth letter from my aunt and opened it, reading it while Em quietly snored in the bed.

Lottie,

I hope the party was a success. God, I love a good party. I love a bad party too, because then you can steal a little bit to drink and go out on the balcony with a friend and make your own kind of fun.

This next task is less fun but still important, I think.

I want you to go and say good-bye to my house.

Say that out loud (I just did, because I’m dying of cancer and can do whatever I want) and it sounds a little silly.

How does one say good-bye to a house?

But oh, I loved that house. I loved that house with you and your brother. Playing croquet (the silliest game) and making brownies and watching movies. Ihave secretly loved that my workaholic brother married a workaholic woman because it meant that I got you kids so often, and we really had a chance to just hang out. What I wouldn’t give for another hundred of those hangouts!

But soon it will be someone else’s house, and that’s okay too. It will have a whole new lifetime of things happening inside it.

But a piece of it will always be ours, I think.

Go say good-bye to that piece for me.

Love, H.

I put the letter away. I watched Em toss in her sleep. I tried to imagine a new family moving into Aunt Helen’s house, and a tiny sliver of my brain reared up in angry protest.

But that wasn’t right. Because the alternative was worse. The house staying empty forever—that didn’t make any sense at all. I thought of Margo wandering around her house after her parents disappeared, and my heart broke for her and for me and for the losses we’d had to endure.

I wasn’t tired at all. I crept quietly across the room to takeAlvin Hatter and the Return of the Overcoat Manoff its shelf. I opened it to a random page and began to read.

Em was gone when I woke up. She always got up at the crack of dawn to go running, no matter how late she’dbeen up the night before. She was the golden child of our high school track team and was going to college on an almost full scholarship. I’d never seen anyone run as fast as Em. She said it was because there were a lot of closed-minded people in the world she needed to get away from.