And Her Smile Will Untether the Universe by Kiste Gwendolyn

Author:Kiste, Gwendolyn [Kiste, Gwendolyn]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: JournalStone
Published: 2017-04-14T04:00:00+00:00

THE FIVE-DAY SUMMER CAMP

Oh, what fun you’ll have!

That was all we heard from our parents the morning we left for camp.

My older sister Madeline rolled her eyes. “They pretend I haven’t already been there.”

We had nothing to pack—the camp would issue our uniforms when we arrived—so I sat cross-legged on the floor of our room as Madeline made her bed. She was careful about it, tucking this corner and smoothing that wrinkle, as though this was the most important task she’d ever performed. Our mother called upstairs to tell us to hurry so we wouldn’t miss the bus, but I didn’t move, not until Madeline was finished.

Nearby, the comforter on my mattress was undisturbed. I never slept where I belonged. Every night, once the lights went out—all over the city at nine o’clock on the dot—I would creep across the floor and curl up beside my sister. She was warm, and her skin smelled sweet like cinnamon, like a home we’d never known. Tucked beneath her blanket, I invented silly stories of us floating on clouds or swimming a mile beneath the ocean, tales that usually made her smile. But last night, she’d shaken her head and said, “I won’t always be here, Arabella. You need to grow up and stop hiding in make-believe.”

I pretended not to hear her. She was always morose right before camp, and this year was worse than most. This was her third year. Her last chance.

“And what if the rumors are true?” our mother was asking when Madeline and I came downstairs. “What if it runs in families?”

“Everything will be fine,” our father said, his tenor steady as the tides. “The men at camp know best.”

When they noticed us standing there, they smiled as if everything was perfectly normal. This was how they always looked. Our parents never screamed or cried or even frowned, except on Red Days, and this wasn’t a Red Day. This was a normal morning, and they were a normal mother and father.

“We hope to see you soon,” they said to Madeline before turning to me and adjusting my shoulders so I wouldn’t slouch.

“Did you make your bed?”

I smiled. “Of course.”

“You’re a liar,” Madeline said when we were alone on the sidewalk. “You haven’t made that bed in years.”

“Nope.” I looped my arm in hers. “And I never will.”

She laughed, and the crisp melody of her joy was like a most beautiful rapture.

“What a dreadful little sister I have,” she said, and hugged me so close I could barely breathe. Above us, a small red light pulsed at the top of the streetlamp. We pretended not to see it. We weren’t supposed to know about the neighborhood cameras. There were many things we shouldn’t know, but knew anyhow. Adults always thought kids were too stupid to figure out the truth, and sometimes, it was easier to let them go on believing that.

Up and down the sidewalk, other kids like us waited for the bus, and all the parents grinned from their front porches and bid us farewell.

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