Sometimes saving someone doesn’t end well for everyone. Sometimes it doesn’t end well for anyone.

When she doesn’t speak, I ask, “What’s it like there?”

“It’s okay. It still feels like everyone’s pretending, but…not like before.”

She’s staying with a new family now—a temporary one that looks after people like Amy. They have two kids of their own, but she doesn’t talk about them.

“It’s not forever,” I reply, and then, “Nia says hi.”

They talk on the phone, too, but always behind closed doors. I don’t know what they say to each other, and I won’t ask.

Sometimes Nia tells me stories about Amy before the accident. She feels guilty for not realizing the change was more serious than kids’ stuff, but it’s not her fault. My sister is making up for lost time, now, and I can feel Amy’s smile down the phone when I mention her name.

“I miss you,” I whisper.

“Me too.”

I still see her in the gaps she used to fill. I picture her behind the curtains in a house that’s now a crime scene. I remember her smiling at me from across the courtyard at school. And I feel her when I sit by the head-start line and repeat the conversations we had before I dug too deep.

What Mum says about memories—that a few, some good and some bad, become tattoos on your soul—well, Amy is one of those tattoos.

97

We spoke a lot about moving because, even when you buy new doors and wardrobes and replaster the walls, there are some things you can’t change. Houses have echoes, and this one has more than most.

But Mum wanted to stay. “We can’t change what happened here,” she said. “But we can write a new story.”

Nia raised her eyebrows at me because it was pretty cheesy, but, out loud, she said, “Cool.”

And that was that. We stayed.

“Whose choice is it?” Jay asks.

Aaron yells, “Tom’s!”

I used to hate the pressure of being in charge of family film night. Whatever I picked would piss off someone—usually Nia—and Aaron would be huffy that he couldn’t sing along. But, tonight, I’m happy to choose.

I used to wait to be invited into a circle of four. And, even then, I’d feel awkward. Now I don’t wait because this is my home.

When the film’s over, Nia tucks her brother in while Mum and Jay tidy up.

So much is the same as it used to be. But not everything.

I stand outside the bedroom and watch my sister play some tunes and whisper made-up stories. Then I come in without asking and sit next to her on the bed. She smiles, then carries on whispering because Aaron won’t sleep until he’s happy with the ending.