Page 22 of A Thousand Little Goodbyes

“Oh, Chrissie. I didn’t mean it, I swear!”

She rushed back and threw her arms around Chrissie’s shoulders. All at once, she remembered the other things the hospital and school said about her.

She doesn’t think through the consequences of her actions.

Her heart’s in the right place, but that impulsive nature of hers is going to be her undoing.

“I’m sorry I said that,” she said, wishing she could eat the words—and, by extension, Chrissie’s tears. “I’m sure they’ll take you with them next time. I bet they’re thinking of you and wishing they’d gone to Disneyland instead.”

Chrissie sniffled and looked so sad that Scarlett could have bitten off her own tongue. “They’re not thinking of me,” she said. “All theycan think about is Malcolm. They worried about him for so long that they don’t know how to do anything else.”

That was when Scarlett decided to take matters into her own hands. Chrissie almost never talked about her brother’s death or how her parents had turned to stone because of it, about the hours she spent at the piano in hopes of getting them to pay even alittleattention to her, but Scarlett knew. She knew down to her very bones.

“Which room is his?” she asked.

“Scarlett, no. We can’t.”

“Yes, we can. Who’s gonna stop us?” Scarlett flung open the nearest door to show a dark green study with giant deer heads mounted on the walls. “Oh, ew. Did your dad shoot all those?”

Chrissie didn’t allow herself to be distracted. “Let’s just go get Mr. Bunny. I think my mom put him in the linen closet.”

Scarlett marched forward to open the next door (a bathroom) and the next (another bathroom). “Why does your house have so many toilets? My grandma’s church doesn’t even have this many, and those old ladies takeforeverto pee.”

Chrissie was betrayed into a giggle—just like Scarlett had hoped—but she resolutely shut all the doors. “It’s upstairs, but I don’t like to go in there. It’s…”

“Creepy?” Scarlett suggested. “Sad? A place you’re never allowed to go even if the whole house is on fire and it’s the only way out?”

Chrissie nodded. “Yeah.”

“Then we’ll go there together. I want to see what all the fuss is about.” Scarlett slid her hand in Chrissie’s and stood there holding it. She knew it was only a matter of time before Chrissie gave in and led the way.

That was the thing about Chrissie—the thing that Scarlett liked most about her. She was terrified of everything and hesitant to stepeven an inch out of line, but that never seemed to stop her from living her life anyway.

“Okay,” Chrissie said. “This way.”

They tiptoed up the carpeted stairs to a dark, quiet hall that Scarlett could totally tell was haunted. Malcolm’s room was the last one on the right, the only door in the whole house that was open a crack.

“They never close it,” Chrissie whispered as she put a palm flat on the wood and pushed. “I don’t know why. I think they’re afraid that if they do, they’ll have to admit that I’m all they have left.”

Scarlett didn’t scream all the things that were stuck in her throat.Your mom is even worse than mine, and mine abandoned me to my grandmother the day I got sick. Why do they care so much about one stupid dead son when they have the best daughter in the world right here? Let’s burn the whole house down and dance naked on the ashes!Instead, she just nodded and allowed Chrissie to lead her inside.

The room was disappointing, to say the least. Scarlett had always thought that ghostly shrines were supposed to feel like stepping into church when all the lights were off or sitting in front of a television screen showing nothing but static. Instead, she found herself standing in a bedroom with dark blue old-fashioned wallpaper and a huge window overlooking the backyard. The bed was neatly made, the dresser free of everything except a single bronze trophy. True, there was a stack of Hardy Boys novels arranged on the bedside table and a framed poster of a bunch of piano keys on it, but even those felt bland in comparison with every other bedroom in the world.

“Huh,” Scarlett said. She frowned as she whirled around, looking for a dirty sock or a stack ofMadmagazines—anythingto indicate that a living, breathing boy had once slept here. “It’s not very interesting, is it?”

Chrissie shrugged. “My room is basically the same, only in pink and with Nancy Drew instead of the Hardy Boys.”

For some reason, that made Scarlett feel even worse about what she was seeing. “Do you at least get a trophy, too?” she asked as she touched a fingertip to the bronze.

That was when she realized it wasn’t a trophy at all. It was an urn.

Scarlett knewallabout those. Once, one of the kids at the hospital had brought in a brochure from a funeral home. It had been full of silk-lined caskets and huge, fat-bellied urns, all of them promising a “fitting goodbye for your dearest loved ones.” A bunch of the kids had sat on Scarlett’s bed picking out their favorites. It hadn’t been asadday—she remembered them dog-earing the pages and laughing over things like special pockets for hiding their favorite treasures to carry with them into eternity—but one of the moms had come in and yelled so much that they’d all ended up in trouble with the nurses.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t know.” She peeked over her shoulder to make sure Chrissie wasn’t breaking down or anything, but she only stood in the doorway with her arms crossed over her stomach, looking more guilty than upset. “Is it weird to know his ashes are sitting up here? Even when you, like, eat dinner?”

“A little.” Chrissie paused. “Can we get Mr. Bunny now? I’m ready to go home.”

Her use of that word—home—made something in Scarlett’s chest give a lurch. Chrissie wasn’t talking about this big, grand house where she wasn’t allowed to touch anything or hang posters on the wall. She was talking about the cramped apartment where Scarlett and Grandma had to carry their laundry down the street to the laundromat and then sit forhourswaiting for it to dry because if you left it there for even a minute, someone would take the pile out and leave it sopping wet on the floor.