She was out of breath when she opened the door and went inside.

Kate smiled tiredly. “Let me guess: you’ve got a film crew with you.”

“Very funny.” She eased around the curtain and stood by the bed. “Your mom tells me you’re still having trouble with Marah.”

“It’s not your fault. She’s scared of all this and she doesn’t know how easy it is to say you’re sorry.”

“I didn’t.”

“You always were her role model.” Kate closed her eyes. “I’m tired, Tully . . .”

“I have a present for you.”

Kate opened her eyes. “What I need can’t be bought.”

Tully tried not to react to that. Instead, she handed Kate the beautifully wrapped gift and helped her open it.

Inside was a hand-tooled, leather-bound journal. On the first page, Tully had written: Katie’s story.

Kate stared down at the blank page for a long time, saying nothing.

“Katie?”

“I was never really a writer,” she finally said. “You and Johnny and Mom all wanted it for me, but I never did it. Too late now.”

Tully touched her friend’s wrist, feeling how fragile and thin it was; the tiniest pressure could leave a bruise. “For Marah,” she said quietly. “And the boys. Someday they’ll be old enough to read it. They’ll want to know who you were.”

“How do I know what to write?”

Tully had no real answer for that. “Just write what you remember.”

Kate closed her eyes, as if the thought alone were too much to bear. “Thanks, Tully.”

“I won’t leave you again, Katie.”

Kate didn’t open her eyes, but she smiled just a little. “I know.”

Kate didn’t remember falling asleep. One minute she was talking to Tully, and the next—she was waking up in a dark room that smelled of fresh flowers and disinfectant.

She’d been in this room for so long it almost felt like home, and sometimes, when her family’s hope was more than she could bear, this small beige room comforted her with its silence. Within these blank walls, when no one else was around, she didn’t have to pretend to be strong.

But right now she didn’t want to be here. She wanted to be at home, in her own bed, in her husband’s arms rather than watching him sleep in the hospital bed on the other side of the room.

Or with Tully, sitting on the muddy banks of the Pilchuck River, talking about David Cassidy’s newest album and sharing a bag of Pop Rocks.

The memory made her smile, and with it came a lessening of the fear that had wakened her.

She knew she wouldn’t fall back asleep without medication and she didn’t want to wake the night nurse. Besides, she had little enough life left to her; what was the point in sleeping?