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By Root 557 0

Inside, it felt like a different planet, like I could breathe ten times better. Lily let me buy a bunch of things, some marigolds, which are orange and brown, and dahlias, which she says come in a lot of different kinds, and she has a bunch of them and they will start blooming in a few more weeks, she says, so I’ll take pictures and send them. She let me take one with her camera, and although she couldn’t figure out how to upload it, I did and it’s attached here for when you wake up. Me and the garden.

Anyways, everything is okay here, but I really miss you, Dad, and I can’t wait until you come home.

Love, Katie

Katie is writing on the computer, which is on a built-in desk right next to a balcony looking down into the living room. It’s the best thing she’s ever seen in a house. In fact, the entire house is amazing, with the ceiling at all angles and hidden window seats piled up with pillows. Lily showed Katie to a room at the end of a long, long hallway and said she could use it whenever she was over. It used to be Ramona’s room, but it’s been decorated since then with turquoise and green rugs and a bed that’s kind of low to the ground. The window is really high, looking down a rocky ledge and over the mountains. The first time Katie looks out, she feels dizzy, but the view is of mountains upon mountains upon mountains, like velvet cutouts in layers and layers of blue.

Although it makes her feel like a traitor, and a super-spoiled traitor at that, Katie thinks this room is ten times better than the one over the bakery, and that was the prettiest room she’d ever had before this. It scares her even to think it, as if maybe not appreciating it enough might make it go away.

So she acts all bored (Nonchalant, she writes in her mind to Madison), like she’s seen these kinds of things a million times, even though she could stare out that window forever. It makes her feel quiet inside. And when Lily asked if she wanted to spend the night, it was really hard for Katie to say, “No, thank you. I have to take care of my dog.”

“Oh, honey, Ramona can take care of Merlin. We can call and ask. If you want to stay, that is.”

But she decides to just have dinner and then go home. She loves being able to get on the computer and surf around. She writes an email to Madison, telling her about the day, and then, looking over her shoulder just in case, she opens another email.

TO: laceymomsoldier@prt.com

FROM: katiewilson09872@nomecast.com

SUBJECT: from Katie, saying hi

Hi, Mom.

Just checking to see if you got email yet. I’m having a good time here, so don’t worry about me. Sofia’s grandma is really nice to me and she helped me plant a bunch of flowers today, but I miss you a LOT.

She chews on her lip, thinking. What else can she say to her mother? By now she’s probably feeling pretty crummy. Katie has seen her get off meth before—three times, as a matter of fact. Once she lasted only a couple of weeks, another time it was a year—that was when Katie lived with Sofia and Oscar. It wasn’t bad living there; she just felt like a traitor about her mom. So when Lacey stayed clean for a whole year, and Oscar was deployed again, he let Katie go live with her mom, as long as she promised to let him know the minute Lacey started using again.

Don’t think about that now.

She writes:

I know you probably don’t feel very good, but remember: You can do it! You got clean before and felt really good, remember? Once you get out, I can come and live with you again. I love you! Lots! Lots! Lots!

Your daughter,

Katie

PS—Dad got hurt really bad in Afghanistan. Probably nobody told you, so I thought you should know.

She wants to write more, wants to pour out her worst fear about her dad—not that he will die but that he will look like a soldier who used to shop at the commissary, his nose burned off, the skin of his face all pink and white and stiff. If he looks like that, how can she love him? It makes her shudder.

And that makes her feel like the worst person in the world, that she would be afraid of her dad having a messed-up face even more than she