But on the other hand, this meant it wasn’t my fault. This meant it was science.

I didn’t need to feel bad about science. Right?

Or did this mean there were more and more things I couldn’t do?

But then my mom said something.

“I’m really proud of you, sweetheart.”

Proud? I didn’t feel like anything to be proud of. I felt confused, trying to figure out how to fit the me that wanted to cry with relief next to the me that was stuck in a locked box with no key.

I looked at my mom.

She said, “You … I know you try so hard. With everything. That piano recital…”

“The one that went supernova bad?”

“No,” Mom said. “No, it’s like you played with your hands tied behind your back. And you got up and played anyway.”

I looked at my knees. There was too much heat in the car. The hot-behind-your-eyes kind of heat, and what-if-there-are-lots-of-things-I-can’t-do heat, and mom-is-proud heat. It’s not that I would be embarrassed to cry when it’s just my mom, but I never know what to do in that kind of heat. Such serious, somber heat. It makes me fidgety. I had to let out some of the steam.

So I sat on my hands, lifted my feet onto the dashboard, and started humming my old piano piece while wiggling my toes.

Mom laughed, and we pulled out of the parking lot. I hoped she knew what I was trying to say inside the joke. A different kind of inside joke.

And some of the behind-the-eyes-heat went away.

For now.

There’s a Monster at the End of This Brain

That night Nonny looked pale. Paler than normal, which is saying a lot. Looking dangerously close to the gray-faced-nausea type of pale from before. She kept saying she was fine, but I could tell she wasn’t feeling well.

I boiled some water and made her some orange marmalade toast and herbal tea. Mom and Dad were out on a date together, but Mom had taught me how to make tea, even though I’d broken a couple of mugs in the beginning. Still, though, it was kind of strange being alone in the kitchen.

Nonny was lying on the couch, her eyes closed, her long dark hair draping down to the floor, and if I was a good artist I would have wanted to paint her. I think it was the orangey smell of the tea that made her look over at me, and she smiled. I was glad to see a touch of color in her cheeks when she did.

“Oh, you. You didn’t have to do that,” she said.

I put the mug and the plate of toast on the coffee table by the couch. Nonny curled herself up and I sat down at her feet. She took the mug in both hands and breathed in the steam and sighed when she took a sip.

“Thank you,” she said. “You’re my favorite sister.”