by Lucy Frank
It’s setting off my evil juice!”
“I’m setting off my
evil juice. Sorry.”
“And what’d I tell you
about apologizing!”
“How ’bout
‘We don’t take stress,
we give stress’?”
“Yeah, well,
don’t give your stress to me!
“Yeah. Hey. It’s Shannon,”
she calls into the intercom.
“Could somebody please
come in here and unhook me?”
“Where you going?”
“For a walk.
“I’m supposed to be walking.
So I’m taking a walk.”
“What if Mom comes
and you’re not here?
No. Never mind.
No worries. Go ahead.
We’ll find you.”
“For what?”
“So you and I can …
you know …”
“Are you not hearing me?
For what? A month from now
we could pass each other
on the street and never know.
“And don’t gimme some shit about
how sorry you are to be leaving.
Cuz if it was me?
And I was leaving you here?
I’d be like, ‘Bye!’ ”
“Yes. And I’d get it.
Because we’re friends, you and me.
And you’re not just my friend, okay?
What Joyce, the nurse, said yesterday?
About don’t be a hero?
I don’t mean this to sound cheesy,
but you really are my—”
“YO! NURSE! KELLIANNE!
ARE WE WALKING, OR WHAT?”
I can’t remember
feeling this glad
to see my mom
since the first week
of preschool.
“Excuse me.”
We’re just gathering up my bags
when Kellianne walks through the door.
“Shannon said don’t wait.
She said something might be … you know …”
Comes closer,
drops to a half whisper:
“About to happen. Gas-wise.
“She thought it might not be that cool
for you if she stuck around.
“Oh, wait! That’s her,
buzzing me now!”
“Do not hug me.
I don’t do huggy.”
“Too bad.” I hold on
till Shannon’s arms
tighten around me.
When she lets go,
in purple pen I scribble
my contact info on her hand,
Dragon-eye her right back
as I pass the pen to her.
“Now I need yours.”
As Mom rolls
my unnecessary mandatory wheelchair
toward the elevator,
I hear:
“Do I need that brave little ‘you’re my hero’ shit?
A, I may be short, but I am not little.
B, no brave about it. You do what you do
and you get through.
Which I will do.
“Now Job One’s done,
it’s time to get myself cute again,
get my driver’s license,
get my daughter home with me …
“And how’s she expect me to call her
when she can’t even write the numbers
so you can read ’em?
“Hey, Kellianne,
Is that a four or a nine?”
AFTER
In starry dark a girl
sings while a boy
strums his guitar.
Her new running shoes flash
as they jog through
coppery October light.
In a booth
close to the bathroom
in an old Chinese restaurant
Two girls share
pistachio ice cream
with a little girl here for the holidays.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book has been a long journey. I have many people to thank:
Theresa Nelson, Susan Patron, and Virginia Walters, for believing in The Girls from the beginning, for patiently reading and rereading, cheering me on, and putting up with what must have seemed like endless whining.
Deborah Heiligman, Patricia Lakin Koenigsberg, Elizabeth Levy, Roxane Orgill, and Erika Tamar, for their sustaining friendship, brilliant suggestions, and fine editing skills these many years.
Phyllis Reynolds Naylor, for creating the PEN/Phyllis Naylor Working Writer Fellowship, and for her warmth and enthusiasm when The Girls received the award.
My editor, Anne Schwartz, for believing that the early pages she saw could be a book, and then, with tenacity and great good humor, urging it into being and making it more than I’d dreamed. Stephanie Pitts, for her enormous care with the manuscript from beginning to end.
I must also thank Richard Jackson, from whom I’ve learned so much, so happily.
Chess and Shannon’s story is entirely fiction, but I’ve tried my best to get the medical details right and to accurately present what is known about Crohn’s disease at this time. For that, and so much else, I thank Dr. Scott Weber.
There are no words for my gratitude to my husband, Peter Frank, for his incomparable editor’s eye and for encouraging, inspiring, and sticking with me. Through everything.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lucy Frank won a PEN/Phyllis Naylor Working Writer Fellowship for her work on Two Girls Staring at the Ceiling. The author of eight novels for young adults and middle graders, she divides her time between New York City and upstate New York. Learn more at lucyfrank.com.