Amy Inspired - Bethany Pierce [41]
“Don’t hold your breath,” he said. “Breathe consistently: in, out. In, out.”
I nodded. It was difficult to hear him over the roar of blood in my ears. Zoë had been right about the layers. Though I could feel the cold wind numbing my nose and chafing my cheeks, I was sweating profusely. Beside me, Michael’s body moved with the seeming effortless grace of a trained athlete. His arms swiveled easy and loose at his sides. His feet padded buoyant on the sidewalk, the rubber soles of his shoes bounding off the cement. Somewhere to my left he spoke with the maddening calm of a husband coaching his wife through labor. “That’s good. In, out. In, out. Watch your step.You’re doing great!”
At the edge of campus I stopped and bent over, resting my hands on my knees. “I don’t think … I should overdo it … the first … time.”
“Walk it off,” he said. “Head back to the apartment on Collins Street. I’ll do a loop through campus and catch up with you.”
I nodded in agreement.
It took two blocks for my breathing to slow and my legs to unwind. Once Michael was out of sight, my power walk slowed to an amble. Campus was quiet. Occasionally, a student passed on the sidewalk or drove by talking (or, more alarmingly, texting) on a cell phone. I imagined students bunkered in their dorm rooms, sleeping off the previous night’s party or cramming anxiously for an early Monday exam. I heard girls’ laughter behind the bathroom doors and could smell the pungent funk of the men’s hall: dirty socks, sweating bodies, and the miasma of trapped hormones.
Somewhere in that crowd, Ashley was trying to pioneer her own life. She had hours and days to spend; I wondered if the absence of a loved one left any capacity for the normal. When she’d said her little sister died I’d pictured a child, a miniature version of Ashley with pigtails and baby cheeks. But I still called Brian my little brother, and he was twenty-five.
I made it back to the apartment without seeing Michael again. Eli met me at the door with my ringing cell phone.
“Third call you’ve missed,” he said.
“Mom.”
“Hey, honey,” she chirped. “Just calling to ask if you returned that sweater yet.”
“I haven’t had time.”
“Don’t keep it just because I bought it for you. I don’t like it when people keep things they don’t like to be nice, you know that.”
I kicked off my shoes. “Honestly, I just haven’t had a chance to return it.”
“I put the receipts in the boxes before you left, so make sure you don’t lose them.” Her voice tapered off. I thought I heard Richard in the background. “Amy—are you still there?”
“Ye-es.”
“Did you check those batteries yet?”
“No.”
“You girls live on the second floor. Smoke rises, you know.”
When I hung up I could hear Eli in Zoë’s room one wall away, talking to Jillian. She was the only person he talked to on the phone for more than five minutes. Sometimes he emerged from these conversations cheerful. Other times they put him in a black mood that didn’t lift for hours. From the low, frustrated murmur of his tone I predicted tonight would not be a good night.
I showered, dressed, began dinner. The three of us ate separately. I took a book to bed, in need of distraction.
In the middle of the night I woke with a start, the book Empire Falls flat on my face. I was sweating as if I had just come inside from a long run. There had been fire, someone screaming—had it been my brother?—but the details of the nightmare had vanished upon waking. I stared at the ceiling, palms flat against the mattress, feeling my heart pound.
When I’d calmed down I got up from bed and crept into the living room. The minute hand on the bookshelf clock clicked its way around the hour. Eli lay on the couch, still dressed, his arms curiously folded over his chest as