HER SECRET 24

‘Sometimes I just feel things. Don’t you ever wake up in the morning and know it’s gonna be a good day or a bad day?’

‘No. I’m always surprised.’

She shook her head. Matt studied his sister’s face. Beneath the forced brightness, her face was laced by dark lines of fatigue. This was the first evening he could remember that she hadn’t gone back to the hospital.

‘Don’t take it so lightly. That’s the trouble with you. You see signs and ignore them. The morning of Jerry’s accident, I woke up dreamin’ I answered the phone and it was the hospital callin’ to say he’d been hurt. All day I tried to shake it off, you know, disregard it as nonsense like you’re doin’. Then that evenin’ it really happened. I kept hopin’ I’d wake up again and find I was still dreamin’.’

He set a hand on her shoulder. She flashed him a strained smile.

‘Ma was right about there bein’ some things in life that control us and we can’t do nothin’ about them. But I keep thinkin’ if I’d believed, made Jerry stay home . . .’