“Yeah,” I said, “but she didn’t like me. It was always just you and Mom learning to box. You and Mom talking sports. You and Mom out at the range shooting guns. And me? Nobody cared what books I ever read or what movies I wanted to watch, the old black-and-white ones where everybody’s beautiful all the time. Nobody read any of my poems, nobody gave a shit that I even wrote them. And don’t get me started on the visions. Both of you just looked at me like I was some kind of freak, and you always have. But not Grandma. Grandma loves me. She even likes me. So do Cass and the kids at the tenant house. So does everybody in this whole town. And you can’t stand it. That’s why you’re being such an asshole about all this.”

“You better watch your fucking mouth, big brother,” said Murphy, her finger in my face, just like Mom used to do. Just like Horace.

“Or what? You’re going to kick my ass? You’re no better than Horace.”

Murphy swung once. Hit me square in the eye, knocked me flat.

I looked up at her from the floor, my face already throbbing.

“Shit,” she said. “Jesus, I’m sorry.”

“Fuck off, Murphy,” I said, and I scrambled upstairs before she could see me cry.

Chapter 33

I lay in my bunk, alone and furious.

Murphy and I had never really fought before, not like this. I mean, as much as she didn’t always like me, at least Murphy had my back. I probably should have told her all my secrets already, but I didn’t want to, not yet. Something told my heart to wait, that the time wasn’t right. And I trusted that feeling. I was starting to trust my feelings more and more, to believe that where they were leading me was right. It was working out pretty great so far. And if Murphy didn’t understand, if she couldn’t be happy for the changes I was going through and all the beautiful things happening in my life, then maybe I didn’t need her after all. If my sister couldn’t support me now, when I was finally finding my place, then what good was she to me?

I rewound the second tape and played it again and again, Jeremiah’s words flashing like hummingbirds through my mind. I shut my eyes and listened while thunder grumbled outside, while the rain pattered on my window.