"Did not."
"Did."
I hand him the cards. I watch his long fingers shuffle them easily. He divides the deck into two even piles and gives one to me. Then we begin to lay cards down in threes to fight each other. Higher numbers beat lower. Jack of spades beats nine of diamonds. Five of hearts beats two of spades. Aces beat all. The goal to win the entire deck.
"What do I get if I win?" he asks suddenly. He has just taken three of my cards.
"What do you want?"
"I think," he says without emotion, "that if I win you have to stop watching me die. It"s a little morbid."
He takes three more of my cards.
"So what do you want?" he asks. "If you win."
I stare into his hazel eyes. I want to answer that text in time, I think. I want to save you. But underneath it all is: "I want to have a chance to say goodbye. I never got to say goodbye. You didn"t give me that."
He exhales a laugh. "Okay. Deal. If you win you can say goodbye."
This seems unlikely. He"s winning the game. He has most of the deck. I know it will be over soon, and I am terrified to wake up and never see him again, never be able to talk to him.
"Ty . . ."
"The people we love are never truly gone," he says. "Haven"t you learned that?"
"Oh, don"t tell me you listen to Dave."
He looks at me steadily and takes another set of my cards. "You did say goodbye to me, you know. Don"t you remember?"
"What?"
"That morning. You said come on, I was going to miss the bus. I said one of my friends was going to give me a ride."
"Which was a lie," I add.
"Yes, it was," he admits. "But then you said, "Okay, see you later," and I said, "Love you, sis." And you said, "Love you, too, bro. Bye.""
"I said that?"
"You said that."
I remember. I remember.
And as I sit there, remembering that small single moment in time, I"m suddenly flooded with other memories of Ty.
Good memories.
So many good memories. Building my first snowman in that front yard with Ty. Helping Mom in the garden. Ty trying to eat corn on the cob without the benefit of his two front teeth. Raking leaves with Ty. Teaching him how to drive. Clinging to his arm when we secretly rented Jura.s.sic Park when I was twelve. The funny way he laughed. The time he tried to cut his own hair. The male Man. The time when I was four and I dressed him up in my old clothes and put a wig on him and walked him around the neighborhood introducing him as my new sister, Vikki. The way every year on the first day of school Mom had us stand in the same spot on the front porch and she took our picture together, holding hands, year after year after year.
My first day of kindergarten, when he clung to my hand and wouldn"t let go when I tried to go off to school without him.
"Take me with you," he begged.
"I can"t. You have to stay," I said. "But I promise I"ll come back. And then we"ll play."
"See?" he says now.
I say, "I miss you. I will always miss you."
"I miss you, too," he says. "For what it"s worth."
I lay down a king of clubs, which he takes with an ace, and a ten of diamonds, which he beats with his jack of hearts. I only have one card left.
"Bye, Ty," I whisper.
He smiles and turns his card over.
From the Author.
My brother killed himself in 1999. He was seventeen years old and a junior in high school; I was twenty and a junior in college. I miss him every day. Those are the facts.
Having said that, I want to clarify that this novel is a work of fiction. My facts are not the ones that occur in these pages. Ty isn"t my brother, and I"m not Lex. I am not a math genius-that much should be obvious. My mom didn"t respond to my brother"s death by taking up drinking (which would have been a disaster, since my mom is a complete lightweight), my father is not a bored accountant (and he"s never graced the deck of a sailboat as far as I know), and my stepmom is not, as Lex phrases it, a walking cliche (my stepmom"s actually a book geek, which has served us well over the years). I"d also like to say that, unlike some of Ty"s friends in the book, my brother had amazing, thoughtful friends. I"ve always been thankful for the way our community of friends and neighbors tried to take care of our family in the days after he died, and the way they"ve continued to show us their love and support in the years since.
So. With the disclaimer out of the way, I have a lot of people to thank for making this book possible: Erica Sussman. Thank you for laughing at Lex"s jokes and crying at Lex"s tears and always making sure I had a thorough understanding of what you loved about this story, even when the editing road for this book was long and difficult. You are the most brilliant of editors.
The always-finding-new-ways-to-amaze team at HarperTeen: Stephanie Stein, Christina Colangelo, Kara Brammer, Ray Shappell, Melinda Weigel, Alison Donalty, and Karen Sherman. You make me look good as a writer when most of my real job involves messy hair and yoga pants.
Katherine Fausset. I say this every book, but it continues to be true. You are the best agent a writer could hope for. I"d be adrift in an ocean of doubt without you. Thank you.
My friends:.
Amy Yowell. Wow, I have so much in the way of thanks for you I don"t even know where to start. For being on my speed dial for math stuff. For your unwavering support of the book and your time reading it and your honest opinion, even though I know it was particularly hard for you to go there. For being the embodiment of a true friend. For driving me home that day.
My Spring ladies: Anna Carey, Veronica Rossi, and Tahereh Mafi. I don"t know if this book would exist if not for a late night in Miami when the three of you read my first fifty pages on your phones and had a fierce discussion of what it needed. You made me think and you made me laugh and you rock.
Brodi Ashton. For being there one rainy day in Idaho, even though I didn"t know you, and there again one rainy day in Texas thirteen years later, when I did, and there so many days after that. If I have to pick a person to be beside me on a roller coaster in the dark, I"ll always pick you.
Jodi Meadows. Thanks for being such a quiet fountain of encouragement. And for taking such excellent notes when I dragged you off to research my session with Miss Penny. I"m so happy to call you my friend.
And finally, my oldest and dearest bestie, Sarah McFarland. The one who takes me to Jamba Juice in the middle of a crisis. The one who"s just there, no matter what, no matter how many miles separate us.
My family:.
My mom, Carol Ware. Thank you for letting me talk through this time in our lives more this year, even though it hurt. You"re always the first person I want to talk to whenever something wonderful or terrible happens, and I"m glad we have that. I love you. I also want to thank Jack Ware, for being very real proof that happy endings are possible even in the saddest of stories.
My dad, Rod Hand. You always tell me that I can do anything, and then you stand back to let me do it. I"m so grateful for that, and I love you.
John. You helped me to understand that, in spite of how impossible it seemed, I really did have the strength within me to write this novel.
Maddie. Thanks for always wanting me to be the one who sings you to sleep, and for how quickly you learned to say, "I love you too, Mom." I needed that.
Will. My little boy. When you heard I had a brother who died, you went and made a headstone for him out of cardboard in the backyard and put flowers on it. The neighbors might have thought it was a bit morbid. I thought it was the sweetest act of empathy I could imagine, and I love you so much, and it breaks my heart that my brother isn"t here to get to know you.
About the Author.
Courtesy Cynthia Hand.
CYNTHIA HAND is the New York Times bestselling author of the Unearthly trilogy. A native of southeastern Idaho, she has graduate degrees in creative writing from Boise State University and the University of NebraskaLincoln. For the past seven years she has taught writing at Pepperdine University in Southern California. She and her family have recently moved back to Idaho, where they are enjoying the fresh air. You can visit her online at www.cynthiahandbooks.com.
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Books by Cynthia Hand.
UNEARTHLY.
HALLOWED.
BOUNDLESS.
RADIANT: AN UNEARTHLY NOVELLA.
(available as an ebook only).
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