Read Online You Are My Only by Beth Kephart - Free Book Online Page B

the couch in whatever rooms we then were living.
    â€œAren’t you a sight for sore eyes?” Miss Cloris says, standing now to wheel Miss Helen the rest of the way in, to the table. Harvey lifts his head and yips, then settles his jaw back onto his front paws.
    â€œI’m afraid I overslept the party.”
    â€œNot at all,” Miss Cloris says. “The custard had to set. And Sophie just got here, besides.” She finds a spoon for Miss Helen, hands her a bowl of custard. She stands there hovering and won’t sit down until Miss Helen has her first taste of the stuff.
    â€œHeaven on earth,” Miss Helen says, swallowing slowly. “I thank you for it.” She’s wearing a pale-peach dress with a scooped round neck and sleeves that come down just past her shoulders and that hair, which is a long, smooth sameness of white. It’s her hands I notice, art-making hands, younger than the rest of her.
    â€œOur newest neighbor has been writing on Kepler,” Miss Cloris says now.
    â€œIs that right?”
    â€œWriting like a poet, might I add.”
    â€œI would have guessed that.”
    â€œTell her your first sentence, Sophie,” Miss Cloris urges. “Don’t be shy.” And when I repeat myself a second time, Miss Helen closes her eyes and smiles.
    â€œOh my,” she says, “you fit right in here. How in the world did you get yourself on Kepler?”
    â€œBy way of the Archimedean solids,” I say, but when Miss Helen and Miss Cloris exchange funny glances, I trade my answer for another. “By way of my mother,” I say. “She has a thing for Kepler.”
    â€œAnd right she should,” Miss Cloris says. “He was a smart man.”
    â€œAlso Imperial,” I say.
    â€œIs that a fact?”
    â€œThat’s an actual fact,” I assure them.
    â€œWe like facts of all kinds.” Miss Helen smiles. She’s eaten halfway through her cup of custard and stopped. Miss Cloris has been watching her, and now I watch her watch.
    â€œEat a little more now, Helen,” she tells her. “For strength.”
    â€œI’m afraid I’m already full.”
    â€œHoney,” Miss Cloris says, “do it for me,” and slow but sweet, Miss Helen obliges—lifts the spoon to the O of her mouth and takes a long time swallowing. “Custard’s good for the soul,” Miss Cloris tells her.
    â€œAnd delicious,” Miss Helen says. “Absolutely.” The words come out like the back end of a sigh. She puts her spoon down and Harvey yawns. “You bad old dog,” she says in a loving voice. She closes her eyes but doesn’t close her smile. Miss Cloris fits her hand over hers.
    â€œI best be going,” I say now, standing, remembering my mother’s Kepler and her rules, and thinking how Miss Helen needs Miss Cloris to coax her through another custard or two, and how I should not be here. Harvey raises his eyebrows at me but doesn’t yip. Miss Helen says I should stay until Joey gets home, but I’m decided. Around the table I go, to give Miss Helen a kiss. I let Miss Cloris walk me through to the door.
    â€œShe’ll be all right,” Miss Cloris says, as if I asked her.
    â€œI know,” I say, but I don’t.
    â€œYou write your heart out on Kepler,” Miss Cloris says, “and return with the news.”
    â€œI’ll do what I can,” I say. “That’s my best method.”

Part Two

Emmy

    A room that isn’t mine. The sound of toss and dream, and sheets like the fried bottom of a pan. At the far end of the room, in a square: sun like it’s been poured into a glass of milk and swallowed—a blank face in a square space of scratch and rake and air clot. I will be smothering down to nothing.
    Fix it, Emmy. Think. Remember.
    A woman with a white skirt whishing. Train eyes on the train tracks, coming. The rain coming down, and I am rescued. In the