Chapter 5

Clive said, "Mom and Dad are always busy, but you still have me.

"I'll keep you company, just like they would.

"I'll learn to cook for you, and make meals just as tasty as Mom's."

He gently patted my head. "Lucy, don't be sad.

"After you finish eating, I'll take you to buy a cake, okay?"

With tears blurring my vision, I snuck a sideways glance at him. He looked way too grown-up for his age, and his eyes were red, just like mine.

He missed Mom and Dad just as much as I did, but he never said it out loud.

Mom and Dad were always gone, then back, then gone again.

Clive was the only one who stuck by me, every single day, never once leaving me alone.

Bit by bit, as I got older, I started to see things from Mom and Dad's perspective.

When Clive turned sixteen, he was so outstanding that he got accepted into the military academy.

There was fighting down south, and Mom and Dad wanted to take him to the front lines to toughen him up and let him see what real battle was like.

He was itching to go, but he couldn't bear to leave me behind, so he flat-out refused.

I was mature enough now to try and put his mind at ease.

"Go on, Clive. Esme will look after me. I'll be okay," I told him.

That was the first time Clive ever left me, at least as far as I could remember.

I missed him, but I didn't dare tell anyone.

I counted the days, waiting for him to come back, day after day.

But what came first was a long-distance call from the school office, half a month later.

The day was bright and sunny, and the campus paths were clear and flat.

As I ran from the classroom to the office, out of nowhere I tripped and fell halfway there.

I gripped the receiver, and after what felt like forever, I finally heard Clive's voice on the other end.

His voice was muffled and full of static, but I could make out him calling my name, hoarse and desperate. "Lucy..."

That was all he managed to say.

All I could hear was his muffled, intense sobbing and retching.

Outside the office, the sky was bright and cloudless.

But right then, it was like all the color drained out of the world.

I couldn't even remember how many days I spent on that endless, rattling train heading south.

I couldn't recall what I felt when I got the news that my parents had died.

The only thing that stuck with me was the camp chief himself taking me to the hospital to see Clive.

Northfield was all sunshine, but down south, it was actually snowing. It was a rare sight.

Clive was standing in the snow outside the hospital, his face pale as he looked at me.

After a long pause, he finally spoke. "Are you Lucia Woods?"

His eyes were dazed, like he didn't even recognize me.

That was the first time he ever called me by my full name.

After the grief hit him, he came down with a high fever and passed out. When he woke up, he didn't remember our parents or me.

On the way home, he suddenly said he wanted to bring a little girl with us.

He said she was a survivor from the battlefield. Her entire family had died, leaving her all alone.

After my parents died, Clive was in the hospital with a high fever, and that girl was in the same hospital room as him.

It was just seven days.

I had no idea what went on between them during those seven days.

And I couldn't wrap my head around why Clive wanted to bring home a kid who was a total stranger.

I tried to reason with him. "Kids like her can go to an orphanage."

Clive suddenly turned and looked at me.

He kept his voice steady. "She's just a poor kid. I'm only lending her a hand."

It was such a simple, ordinary thing for him to say.

But for the first time, I could hear a bit of annoyance and ice in Clive's voice.

Esme, who came along with me, was wiping away tears, her voice shaky as she gently tried to comfort me.

She said, "It's just a kid. If Clive wants to bring her home, let him do it.

"Lucia, he's only forgotten because the pain is too much. Don't push him anymore, alright?"

I was momentarily dazed.

Everyone at the camp tried to talk me down.

They said, "Just let him be for now.

"Lucia, even though he forgot everything, as soon as he found out he still had a little sister, he agreed to come home with you right away.

"Lucia, you two are still just like old times."

I couldn't say another word.

I thought Clive was being impulsive and reckless because of the trauma he'd been through.

But then Alyssa came home with us, and she ended up staying year after year.

Clive stopped caring about me.

He even stopped caring about Jelly, the little cat Mom and Dad gave him when he first joined the army.

Then, for the first time, I heard Alyssa address him as "brother."

I totally lost it and slapped her hard across the face, unable to control myself for even a second.

Clive, furious, pulled her protectively behind him, his anger no longer hidden as he glared straight at me.

That was when it hit me that maybe that winter down south, it wasn't just my parents I lost. Someone else died with them.

For ten years, the brother who once cherished and shielded me was lost to me forever. There was no peace between us anymore.

I snapped out of my long, tangled thoughts.

I left the cemetery and headed back to the institute.

Once I was back, I teamed up with Myron Garcia and got right back to work on our project.

Myron had just finished his master's in quantum chemistry.

Back at the institute, he landed a gig as a professor's assistant. He was doing pretty well for himself.

When he heard I was planning to go to Arioville for grad school, he grinned, clearly pleased.

He said, "Finally, you're using that brain of yours.

"When you come back, I'll try to get promoted to associate professor and pass on the assistant gig with Mr. Phillips to you."

I shot him a sideways grin. "You're not even bald yet and you're already dreaming of being an associate professor? Give it a rest."

I looked at him, but for some reason, my vision was all blurry. I couldn't even make out his face.

His voice suddenly dropped, tense and worried.

He asked, "Wh-what's wrong with you?"

Sweat dripped from my face onto the papers in front of me.

It was only then that I realized I'd broken out in a cold sweat. My back was sticky and clammy.

My head was spinning, and the pen slipped from my hand, clattering to the floor.

Maybe I caught a chill from the wind at the cemetery.

Or maybe it was because I was about to leave, and all those memories of Clive and my parents, stuff I hadn't let myself think about in forever, were crashing back into my mind all at once.

It finally hit me that before Clive turned sixteen, that version of him was gone for good.

I hardly ever got sick these past ten years, but now, here I was.