A Girl Named Ellie by MaryBeth Edmundson

Author:MaryBeth Edmundson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: New Degree Press
Published: 2021-12-02T14:10:16+00:00

Chapter 17

Brandon came out of the rink sometime during my little jaunt down nightmare lane. Even though I have my eyes shut tight, but I know he’s standing there. I can hear him breathing.

“El?” Andrew asks softly. In place of a response, I wrap my arms around my knees. I don’t have any words yet. The memory of running away is still saved on the back of my eyelids like I’ve been staring at a picture too long.

Andrew shifts so he’s at my side. Silently, he puts a hand on my knee, rests it there for a beat, then places it on my shoulder.

His light touch helps pull me back to the present, grounding me in the here and now.

We sit like this, with Brandon standing nearby until my heart returns to a semi-normal pace, and I don’t feel as if I’m about to pass out. Even when I open my eyes, offer my foster brothers a weak smile, Andrew’s hand remains in its place.

“Thanks,” I whisper, realizing how much of a pain I’m being. “I’m sorry.”

Neither of them tells me to forget it, not to be sorry, that it’s not my fault. They don’t sugarcoat it or try to gloss everything over. They don’t say a word. They know their presence is enough.

Brandon eases himself onto the edge of the open trunk, asking, “What was that?”

I blink. “Hmm?”

“You were humming.” He clears his throat and hums out a few notes. My brow knits as the song hits me.

“It’s ‘A Change in Me.’ From the Beauty and the Beast musical,” I say, an involuntary smile lighting my face. “Wow. I haven’t thought about that song in… I don’t know how long.” A memory fills my heart, a joyful, happy memory from a time long ago.

From a time of laughter. “My Mom loved that song. She used to sing it at the top of her lungs, and we would dance around the kitchen.”

Brandon taps his foot against my own. “Sing the chorus for us?”

I’d forgotten how much I loved this song until I started singing. How beautiful it is. How much it meant to my mom.

My mother. Smiling. Laughing. Dancing.

My mother, happy, just as she’d want me to remember her.

My mother, the belle of the ball, the diamond in the rough.

“What was her name?” Andy asks once I sing the last note.

I hesitate. I don’t talk about my parents. I don’t talk about my mother. “Rosalind.” Rosalind Evelyn Hollander.

“What happened to her?”

I almost don’t want to answer that question.

Swallowing, I plow on. I opened this can of worms. I may as well get on with it. “She died. Both of my parents did. I don’t know how, but I don’t really want to. I have my suspicions, but I don’t want them confirmed. When Robbie took me in, my social worker told him the whole story. I heard the word ‘dead’ and couldn’t hear any more than that. When I was twelve, Robbie asked if I wanted to hear what happened. I said no.

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