Exactly where I fit.

When I woke, she was lying beside me. The sun was starting to rise and I wasn’t sure if I was dreaming. She looked still, like a house after everyone had gone to bed, but then she opened her eyes and reached across to touch my face.

“Where did you go?” she asked, still cupping my cheek. I put my hand on top of hers because I wasn’t sure if she was real or if I was lost in a dream.

“Nowhere.”

The pink in her cheeks started to fade.

“I won’t do it again.”

Her eyes got glassy and I felt sadness begin in the roof of my mouth. I squeezed tight and it formed a lump in the back of my throat. I promised myself that this time I would be good and that no matter what, I would not give her another reason to give me away. I promised myself that I would be the person I was supposed to be. The person she wanted me to be.

“Nowhere isn’t a very nice place to be.” She traced her finger down my cheek and under my chin. “There’s something I want to talk to you about.”

Her breaths were long and heavy and their heat spent a second at the tip of my nose before disappearing. The thought of losing her was too much and I didn’t want to watch her say the words, so I closed my eyes. But then I was alone and I felt the letters peeking through the darkness, so I opened them.

“When I was a little girl, I spent a lot of time nowhere.”

I didn’t speak and she was quiet for a few minutes.

“Franny, when I was a little girl, terrible things happened to me. The only place I had to go was nowhere.”

I started to pull at the grass. “What kinds of things?” I wanted her to tell me, but then when she opened her mouth to speak, I was afraid that she would.

“Ugly, terrible things. And until I figured out that I could draw, I thought I was all alone. I was nowhere most of the time. But you don’t need to be nowhere. You will always have me. Always.”