Kaya Bluebird's Arc

Chapter 4 of 4

Kaya woke on the floor by the fort with her cheek on a cushion. The house was quiet. Joy and Elleanor were still under the sheet roof, breathing slow. She sat up too fast. Her stomach clenched hard, a bright twist under her ribs. She got a hand over her mouth and made it down the hall to the bathroom before the first heave came. Green bile hit the water. Then more. She gripped the rim and rode it out, sweat cold on her back. The pain was worse than she had let it get in years. She knew this pain. She had a name for it, four names. She had never said them out loud to her sisters. The front door opened softly. Footsteps in the hall. Lindy's voice, low, checking on the girls first, then following the sound of the sink. "Kaya." Lindy knelt on the tile beside her. She did not touch her yet. She watched the color of what was in the bowl. Her soft eyes went quieter, the way they had at the clinic when she read Joy's chart. "How long has it been this bad?" Lindy asked. "Since last night." Kaya wiped her mouth on her wrist. "It's mine. It's not from them." "Tell me." Kaya swallowed. Her throat burned. She kept her voice under the doorway so it would not carry. "Gastroparesis. Gastritis. Reflux, kind of bad. Nervous stomach. IBS, but milder." She looked at the floor. "The girls don't know. They think I just have a sensitive tummy. That's what I let them think." Lindy nodded once. She did not look surprised. "I fed them the chicken and rice," Kaya said. "I watched them eat it. Then this morning I heard Joy ask if I was okay and I lied to her face. And now my stomach is doing this because I'm — " She pressed her hand flat to her sternum. "Because I did this to them and my body knows." "You didn't do it," Lindy said. "Grief did. You know that." "They're sick because of me." "They're sick because they lost something. You brought them to me." Lindy put a hand on Kaya's shoulder, light. "Now listen. If they see you like this, they will carry it. You know that too." Kaya nodded. Tears slid down without sound. "Rest," Lindy said. "That's the only thing for you right now. I'll sit with them. You lie down." "I can't — " "Rest," Lindy said again. Quieter. "I've got them for an hour." Kaya let herself be walked to her own bed. Lindy pulled the blanket up to her shoulders and left the door cracked. Kaya lay on her side with a hand on her stomach and listened to Lindy settle by the fort in the hall. For the first time since the clinic, someone else was holding the line. Kaya closed her eyes and let go of it.