the balloon-themed bedroom upstairs, and the furniture from top to bottom was a tribute to the worst the ’70s had to offer.
“Sure, Trey,” I said. “This is nice. Nice like All in the Family meets Sesame Street.”
But it was tidy and warm and spacious and in a good part of town, and most importantly, just a few blocks from L’Envie.
“Maybe I’ll buy you a lava lamp as a housewarming present,” Trey said.
I swatted his arm and walked to the bay windows overlooking a small, man-made pond. I tried to picture a younger Shayla out there feeding the ducks, her two-year-old bowlegs pumping stiffly as she chased them into the pond. And I tried to picture a tall, sixty-year-old man, slightly stooped with age and regret, trying to catch her before she fell in, then both of them walking slowly back to the condo, hand in hand, while he pointed out trees and flowers and stones to his tiny, adoring daughter.
It was the “adoring” part I had the most trouble imagining. Yet every surface in the condo seemed to hold pictures of a devoted father and his loving child picking pumpkins, decorating Christmas trees, swimming at the beach, and posing with Mickey Mouse. I hadn’t seen one picture that didn’t reflect utter happiness and mutual affection. Even in the snapshot of Shayla in the hospital that I’d found in a kitchen drawer, the little girl, dwarfed by her big bed and the monstrous teddy bear she was hugging, had something that looked like serenity in her eyes. The note on the back of the picture said, “Shayla—tonsils—Apr. 15,” and I had stared at the handwriting until it blurred, trying to find a trace of familiarity in it.
“So what do you think?” Trey asked from right behind me.
“About what?”
“Oh, you know, the price of gas. The condo, Shelby! What do you think about the condo?”
I sighed and smiled. “It looks just the same as it did last week, and just the same as the week before that.”
“And . . . ?”
I took a deep breath and held the keys up so they dangled between us.
“You’re going to keep it?” He sounded pleased, unaffected by the conflict between the hand-me-down home and my hand-me-down wounds.
“Sorta.” I took his hand and dropped the keys into it. “Can I use the couch if I stay overnight?”
His gray-green eyes got wider. He opened his mouth, then shut it and frowned. When he opened it again, I held up a finger to stanch the flow of perfectly rational arguments I knew was coming and launched into a monologue of my own instead.
“It’s perfect, Trey. Perfect for you. It’s close to work. It’s furnished. . . .”
He wrinkled his nose.
“It’s got a new kitchen.”
He looked more hopeful.
“It’s in a good neighborhood, and—” I grabbed his shoulders—“it’s not a pantry!”
“I don’t sleep in a pant—”
“You do. You’ve moved a cot and a lamp into it, but Trey, it—is—a—pantry!”
“This is your place. He left it to you.”
“And I want you to have it.”
“All right, we’ve got to talk,” he said grimly, taking my hand and dragging me to the couch.
“Trey . . .” We sat facing each other on the green-and-orange hide-a-bed that squeaked when we moved, and Trey kept my hand firmly in his.
“Shell . . .” He paused and shook his head with a smile that said “my sister the doofus.” “You are not giving this condo to me. Period. It’s paid for. It’s cute.”
I raised a dubious eyebrow.
“You know what? It’s everything you just told me it was. So use it! Live in it!”
“It was his,” I said. The words sounded brittle.
“And you think that has any less of an effect on me?”
I shook my head. “I think you’re stronger, though.”
He laughed at that. “And you’re . . . what? Weak? Helpless?”
“Furious.”
“I know. It’s a terrible cut, but seriously, Shell, your hair will grow back.”
“Trey . . .”
“I don’t know why he left it for you, but he did. So . . . be thankful. It’s your place now. At least, it will be once you’ve burned all the furniture and painted some walls. And I know a great bathroom guy if you want to remodel that.”
“You know,” I said, finally voicing the thought that had been on the tip of my mind for the past three weeks, “you should be furious too. You were just as much his kid as I was, and you were hit by just as much of his shrapnel. You were his