Every Little Thing

43

|| Reed ||

I wake to the sound of Evelyn Moore's screams.

Well, I wouldn't exactly call it screaming—it's more like an awful, gurgling noise that pierces every cell in my body with such pain that I can hardly stand it. My eyes snap open and I look down at her still body beside me. Her fists are clenching and unclenching; her face is screwed up in what seems like anger as she screams, louder and louder, until I fear her entire system might shut down.

"Evelyn!" I shout, but she doesn't hear me. Panic begins to flood my senses; I don't know what to do. Oh, God, what do I do?

"Evelyn," I beg, tugging at her arms, "Evelyn, please. Please, wake up. Come on, Evelyn, wake up!"

The last two words come out far louder than I'd expected; they ring throughout the house as Evelyn sits bolt upright, sucking in a huge breath of air. Tears are streaming down her face.

"Evelyn," I whisper, scooting closer to her before she slumps, her head hitting my shoulder and arms wrapped limply around my back. "Evelyn, it was a nightmare. You're okay; it was just a bad dream."

She's still crying, and I feel my heart wrench so hard I want to tear it out of my chest.

Talk about irrelevant things, Mrs. Bracket had said, anything to keep her mind off of it.

"Evelyn, Evelyn, Evelyn Moore," I say, moving a hand up and down her back. "It's okay, Evie. It was a bad dream. It was just a bad dream; you're right here. I've got you. You're right here."

Silence ensues, but her entire body is still shaking. I can only imagine what appeared in her dreams tonight.

Pushing the thought away, I take a deep breath and decide to tell her something. Anything.

"Her name was Fran," I say tentatively. "My mom, I mean. Her name was Fran Louise Bishop."

Evelyn's breathing slows ever-so-slightly, and that's how I know she's listening. I move in closer so that our embrace is tighter, more meaningful, as if we're both hanging onto each other to stay alive.

Which, in some ways, we are.

"She was great, Evelyn. The greatest. She made pancakes every morning and she always smelled like lemon. She loved dogs, and we had one for a while before giving it up, because it kept..."

I trail off with a laugh, an unexpected but welcome sound and it feels like warmth slowly returning to my ice-cold body.

"Oh, my God, Evelyn. We had to give the dog away because he would not stop humping the furniture."

Her laugh is quiet, but sincere. I shake my head, biting back my smile.

"His name was Harold and we got him—you know, fixed and everything, but the dude couldn't give it a rest. Chair legs, couches, pillows—everything was fair game to him. Hallie and I would watch him and just die laughing, but Mom couldn't handle it after awhile. She was always telling him to cut it out, and we even tried to put him in specialized training, but the program gave us a refund. They told us that he couldn't be helped. Hal even took to calling him Harold the Humping Hound."