Sam slows his pace as we walk on, and at a certain point he looks at me. I can see there’s something on his mind. He takes a breath.
   “Aunt G?”
   I look at him.
   “Is there something wrong with Lorna?”
   I blink. “What do you mean, wrong?”
   He drops his eyes to his shoes. “I don’t know…You and mom, everyone’s treating her kind of weird. Yesterday you kept talking about if she was tired, and…you just all acted like she was sick.”
   He looks at me, clear-eyed, expecting a clear answer.
   I take a breath. “Yes, Sam. She’s sick.”
   He says nothing for a moment.
   “How sick?” he says, seemingly determined not to blink. “Bad sick?”
   I think of all the lies that have been told in this family over the years, the lies and the “withholdings of truth.” And I’m just not going to do it, I decide. No matter what my sister thinks.
   “Yes,” I say. “Bad sick.”
   Sam looks away.

“Is she going to die?”
I draw down another breath. In for a penny…

“We don’t know, Sam. We don’t know how long she has. It could be years. But…probably not.”
Sam is quiet, but he nods, not meeting my eyes.

“I’m sorry, Sam,” I say.

He nods again. He’s deflated, but he’s absorbing it, not falling apart. He’s taking it in in his slow, careful way. Abigail underestimated him, I think; probably parents often do. In the end, I suspect I’ll have done her a favor—I’ve been worried about how Sam might hate her when he finally learned the truth and realized she’d kept it from him. Abigail knows what that feels like, after all.

On the curb a few paces away there’s a coffee cart, and I suddenly feel exhausted in the most profound way.
   “I need a coffee,” I say aloud. “I—I’m sorry, Sam,” I add, looking again at the dejected figure beside me. “I’m so sorry that she’s sick. It’s not fair, I know that.”

Sam shrugs, morose, and follows without looking up at me as I move us over to the coffee cart line.

“Can I get you a drink?” I say, and he shakes his head.

I put my hand on his shoulder. “I know this is bad news,” I say. “But it’s so good you got to meet her, you know. Whatever happens next.”

Sam says nothing and a man’s voice says loudly, “Can I help you, ma’am?”

The coffee cart line is all gone.

“Oh,” I look at him. “Black, two sugars, please.” I feel in need of the extra hit right now.