Secret Brother Read Free Page B

Willie?” I asked.
    â€œNot yet. Wait,” he said. He rushed forward to help get her into the backseat.
    The nurse gave my grandfather a prescription for Myra’s pain medication. He took it and then nodded for me to get into the backseat with her.
    â€œDon’t let her fall over or anything, Clara Sue,” he said. “She’s very unsteady.”
    Myra groaned and opened her eyes more. “Where’s Willie?” she asked me.
    I didn’t have to say anything. My tears did all the talking.
    She uttered a horrible moan, and I put my arm around her and buried my forehead against her shoulder. Grandpa drove off silently. I lifted my head quickly and looked back at the hospital.
    We’re leaving Willie , I thought. We’re leaving Willie .
    Myra cried softly in my arms as we rode back to Grandpa’s estate. Everyone came out when we drove through the opened gate. Jimmy Wilson practically lunged at the car, and when Myra was helped out, he lifted her in his arms like a baby to carry her into the house. I could see that everyone had heard the news and had been crying. The person who would take it almost worse than me was our cook, Faith Richards. No one spoiled or loved Willie more than she did.
    Myra was becoming more alert. “Put me down. I can walk!” she cried. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
    Jimmy paused in the doorway and let her down gently. She glared at him, trying to be angry about it, but anyone could see she was putting it on.
    â€œGot your bed all ready, Myra,” My Faith said. My grandmother used to refer to her as “My Faith,” and Willie and I did, too.
    â€œI don’t need to go to bed.”
    â€œYou need to go to bed and rest,” Grandpa said sternly. “No back talk,” he added.
    It was the first thing he had said since we left the hospital. Myra took one look at him and started to head to her room, which was next to My Faith’s at the rear of the estate. Then she paused and looked at me. I knew she didn’t want to be alone, and neither did I. I hurried to her side, and we walked through the wide hallway, past the kitchen and into the corridor that led to her and My Faith’s rooms, all the while not looking at anyone. I was afraid that if I looked at any of them, I would burst into hysterical sobs.
    I was in that place between a nightmare and just waking up, this time fighting against waking up but also pushing away the nightmare. How could all of this be happening to us? How could any of it be?
    We lived in Prescott, Virginia, a community thirty-five miles northeast of Charlottesville that seemed to have been created for millionaires. If you were a resident, it was easy to believe you lived in a protective bubble, which made any misfortune happeningto youor your neighbors seem impossible to imagine and even more impossible to accept.
    â€œFires don’t kill rich people, you know, love,” I heard Myra tell My Faith one day. “Rich people don’t go to jail. Rich people always get saved in the best hospitals by the most expensive and brilliant doctors. Maybe rich people go to a higher class of heaven when they die, and they’re always supposed to die in their sleep without pain, don’t you know. That’s how Lady Willowsby died. She closed her eyes, began dreaming of biscuits and tea, and never woke up.”
    Myra concluded, “That’s in the English Constitution, passed in the House of Lords.”
    â€œAin’t that the truth, I bet,” My Faith said. They both laughed about it. I was always intrigued by how easily My Faith could get Myra to laugh. Except for Grandma Arnold and Willie, she was the only one who could.
    It didn’t surprise me that I recalled that conversation so vividly at this moment. I had heard this before my parents died, and I believed we were all so special that nothing bad would ever happen to us. Everything seemed to tell us so.
    Before our