Will's Red Coat by Tom Ryan

Author:Tom Ryan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2017-03-27T16:00:00+00:00

8

Aragorn and Atticus

Wonder is the heaviest element on the periodic table. Even a tiny fleck of it stops time.

—DIANE ACKERMAN

When you have Will’s past, the challenges come and go. It’s only natural. I understood from the beginning that nothing was guaranteed. So we took each day as it came, the good with the bad, the healthy with the sick.

On some of those days, Will slept soundly. He’d be so still that I’d check to make sure he was breathing. With my hand on his chest, I could feel it rising up and down, the tiny heartbeat pulsed with my touch. Whenever I did this, he rarely stirred. In his relaxed state, I’d whisper to him about our original contract. It was a simple one. “I like having you here, and you’re welcome to stick around for as long as you wish, but please understand, it’s your life to live or leave.”

On one of the hottest summer nights, not even the air conditioners seemed to be helping Will. Atticus and I were on the couch in the living room when Will stumbled out of the bedroom. He was dizzy and swaying. I heard the wheezing right away, and when I walked over to him, he pushed himself against me, wanting me to pick him up. I held him and we looked into each other’s eyes. It was ironic—those cloudy, old, mostly blind eyes said so much when we came face-to-face and he was in my arms. People talked about how beautiful Will’s eyes were, but mostly they were talking about his long black lashes. But his eyes were gorgeous too. They used to be squinty, back when he didn’t know who to trust and the pain was difficult to handle. As he gradually shed the pain and confusion, what was left were pools of innocence, deep and sweet.

He rested his chin on my shoulder, and the rattling in his breathing frightened me.

I came close to texting Rachael to ask her to meet us at her office, but I held off for a few minutes. Instead, I took Will outside. The air was as thick as syrup. He coughed and he choked. We returned to get Atticus, I threw a few things in my backpack, and leading by my headlamp, we walked through the ferns and the undergrowth to the river.

I lit tea candles and placed them on the rocks. I turned on music on my phone and plugged it into a small wooden speaker. Vivaldi flowed, just as the Ellis River did down from the mountains, over my ankles, and beyond us on its way to the Atlantic Ocean.

Atticus sat on his flat rock and watched as fireflies flashed and glowed around him and all over the river. They were like stars dancing and swirling among us, daring to be closer to us than to the rest of the firmament high overhead.

Even in the darkness I could see Will’s eyes looking into mine. I could hear the wheezing in his chest. The struggle to breathe.

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