THE STARS ARE BEAUTIFUL - WATTYS AWARD NEW ADULT WINNER 2019

Callum | 38

I BRACE FOR TWO THINGS as I found room number 708 at Atlanta Memorial: the quiet and the loud.

As I looked down to Andy, I found enough bravery to twist the handle and step into a room I hadn't seen in nearly two months. Scout stared up at the television until I said hello.

"Dr. Trovatto," he said, surprised. "Hey."

I gripped Andy's hand for strength. "How are you, Scout?" The question was asked innocently enough, but we both knew what stood between us. Guilt plagued his face, as if he wasn't sure how to answer. If he was great—I was doomed. If he was terrible—still doomed, but twice as much and without good reason.

"I'm glad you're here," he said finally. His eyes flicked to Andy. "Hey, little man."

Andy was one-hundred-percent Everly's son. He puffed up his chest and chided, "Who you callin' little? You look like a vampire. White as a ghost."

Scout laughed and then winced, hand over chest. "You'd think by now," he panted, "I would know better."

And like some tender miracle, a joke bubbled up inside of me. "You break it, you buy it."

He looked at me in surprise. "I'd totally laugh, but I most definitely don't want to break it, Dr. Trovatto. Not this one, sir." And I had to seize every muscle in my body to prevent the anguish I buried from rushing forth. Andy pulled away from my grasp, and I realized I had been crushing his small hand.

"You like Spider Man?" Scout asked him. "The guy who ownsSpider Man sent me free comics because some nurse posted my story on Facebook and it went viral. I just got the newest issue. Wanna see it?"

Andy shook his head. "I just wanna give you reasons." He held up his box full of Everly mementos.

"Reasons to what?" Scout asked glancing between us.

"Reasons to love your new heart." And my son was suddenly no longer a simple kid. He walked to Scout's bedside and rested the box on a chair. He gave him a sea shell, an outgrown shoe, a baseball, and a pair of knitted cream-colored gloves.

"Hmmm..., the shell is because she liked the beach but she couldn't go in the sun long enough to find pretty shells, so, when we had Fourth of July at Grandpop's beach house, I would look with my dad for shells and we'd bring them back to her. Sometimes we had a whole bucket full. But one time, we only found this one, and she told me it was her favorite because it was like a little lost coin in the dark and me and Pop were good sweepers."

Scout took the shell and then allowed Andy to explain how Everly taught him how to tie his shoes and toss a ball, and how she slept with gloves on her hands because she had a tickle monster that hid inside of her and might sneak into his room at night. The gloves kept them both safe.

With reserve, he pulled a final item from his box.

"What's the story behind this one?" Scout asked, as Andy handed him a folded piece of paper.

"It's a ticket. I made it for you. Well... for your heart." Scout unfolded the paper and read silently. Andy explained, "It's not a real ticket, but Pop said he'd pay for us to go on a real train when you're better."

Scout looked at him after he refolded the paper. "I'd have to have a doctor's approval." They both looked at me.

In that moment, I was not a doctor or a grieving man. I was only a beat trying to once again find a rhythm.

Flashes of lemonade and perfect lilac no longer felt like branding pokers beneath my ribs. I could dream with my eyes open as fate whispered deep into my spirit all the memories of Everly Anne—every last one—all at once. She wasn't as simple as pictures or nostalgia, secrets or genetic failure. She was the hum in my ears that told me the right thing to do, the quietness in a room when I needed to listen, humor amid tragedy, and most of all—the most important thing—she was absolutely not dead.

Her song played inside the wonderment of a curious heart.

It strummed phenomenal, crippling sadness inside of me.Danced like fingers on piano keys across star-filled skies.

And as long as all of those memories we'd built remained in my world, so would she, because I could never stop wondering about her or longing for her or looking north and thinking of her and the complete and utter confusion of why love was linked so fiercely to heartbreak. I couldn't help but to revel a little at how lucky I was to have been able to feel the blunt force of such a hurting; how damn lucky I was to feel.

As Everly's heart thumped inside a chest of second chances, I watched her smile at me. I felt her arms seal around my shoulders. We rode the subway and hoped with Sunday hymns. We stripped bare under waterfalls and told secrets. The softness of her cheek lingered in my fingertips. And her laughter relocated within a dream and woke up inside a new, smaller heartbeat.

Scout looked at me as if I could offer freedom. And for the second time in my life, I was granted the ability to play along with inchoate destiny as I replied with a heavy sigh, "A train ride? Scout—there couldn't possibly be anything better for a heart like yours."