Carved in Her Bones

Tomas

Home looks like home. Banjo sleeps soundly at the foot of my bed. I swear all he does is eat, fart, and sleep. He has a way of taking over the bed, and I'm too in love with him to disturb in any way.

Rhian feels far away. Which is ridiculous when I think about it. Even on FaceTime, even though I know we're geographically far apart, she feels out of reach. As if our friendship only existed within the confines of the hospital, or just in Dublin. And when I left, the friendship stayed with her.

Running my fingers through my hair—which is long overdue for a cut—I wonder if I should go see her in Warsaw. Would that be too presumptuous? The gift was for her. I wanted the satisfaction of knowing I had made her happy, of giving her something I knew she would enjoy. But would my being there ruin the experience for her?

The thought unsettles me.

Then, suddenly, I think of Lolita, and I feel sick.

What kind of man finds a 17-year-old attractive?

What does that make me? Because I wanted her.

But she's 18 now. It's a big deal. Friends spend birthdays together, right?

I pull on a pair of sweats and a t-shirt and head downstairs for breakfast.

Mom is already sitting at the dining table, a cup of tea in hand. She's never been a coffee drinker—just tea. I sit across from her at the massive dining table that seats twenty. That earns me a small smile. It's good to see her returning to normal.

Elodie, our cook, brings in breakfast. She kisses my cheek, as if to say, I missed you, and I'm glad you're still here. I can tell she's happy because she's made pancakes—thick, fluffy ones with fruit and an obscene amount of cream.

Mom watches me eat. Since I've been home, it's become a habit of hers. But it's not the same look as before—no disgust, no lingering disbelief that a prim woman like her could have raised someone as shamelessly greedy as me. Now, it's something else entirely. She's just... happy. Relieved. I make a show of stuffing my mouth full and staring at her. She grins.

I feel what she feels—this quiet, fragile sense of hope. The kind neither of us dares name out loud, for fear of jinxing it.

I hesitate before speaking. "Mama," I start, switching to Spanish, the way we always do at home. "How old were you when you met Dad?"

She pauses, mid-chew, then swallows. "I was sixteen. He was eighteen."

I nod. "Wasn't it weird? Did you ever feel like he took advantage of you?"

She takes her time answering, sipping her tea before responding. "No, not at all. It felt natural. I was young, yes, but he was only two years older. And it never felt... unbalanced. We were friends first."

There it is again—that look. The one she gets whenever she talks about my father, like she's being prodded by a thousand needles at once.

"This is about Rhian, isn't it?" she asks.

I nod.

I've asked myself, over and over, if there was ever a moment when I thought of her as just my young friend. The truth is, I was always drawn to her. Any man with eyes would be.

"She turns 18 tomorrow," I say.

"I see," is all my mother replies.

I pick up my plate and carry it into the kitchen, searching for the one person in this house who always makes things feel simpler.

Elodie is there, as she always is. She taught me how to cook. The hours I spent in this kitchen growing up were some of the happiest of my life. This place—loud, warm, full of movement—was the opposite of the rest of the house. It was a space where things didn't have to be perfect, just good.