"Jesus," he said, giving it another squeeze. Now that he knew what it was, he thought -- or perhaps fancied -- that he could feel how the unevenly splintered pieces of bone mated together, met at a slight angle and fused together by the knitting process. "She made me a sling, and she fed me every meal and brushed my teeth. I had to stop her from following me into the toilet to wipe me up. And I didn't care: She could have broken both of my arms if she'd only explained the photos to me, or left them with me so that I could go on investigating them, but she did neither. She hardly spoke a word to me." She resettled herself against the pillows, then pulled him back against her again and plumped his head against her breasts. "Are you falling in love with me?" she said. He startled. The way she said it, she didn't sound like a young adult, she sounded like a small child. "Mimi --" he began, then stopped himself. "I don't think so. I mean, I like you --" "Good," she said. "No falling in love, all right?" # Auntie died six months later. She keeled over on the staircase on her way up to the apartment, and I heard her moaning and thrashing out there. I hauled her up the stairs with my good arm, and she crawled along on her knees, making gargling noises. I got her laid out on the rug in the living room. I tried to get her up on the sofa, but I couldn't budge her. So I gave her pillows from the sofa and water and then I tried tea, but she couldn't take it. She threw up once, and I soaked it up with a tea towel that had fussy roses on it. She took my hand and her grip was weak, her strong hands suddenly thin and shaky. It took an hour for her to die. When she died, she made a rasping, rattling sound and then she shat herself. I could smell it. It was all I could smell, as I sat there in the little apartment, six years old, hot as hell outside and stuffy inside. I opened the windows and watched the Hasids walk past. I felt like I should *do something* for the old lady, but I didn't know what. I formulated a plan. I would go outside and bring in some grown-up to take care of the old lady. I would do the grocery shopping and eat sandwiches until I was twelve, at which point I would be grown up and I would get a job fixing televisions. I marched into my room and changed into my best clothes, the little Alice-blue dress I wore to dinner on Sundays, and I brushed my hair and put on my socks with the blue pom-poms at the ankles, and found my shoes in the hall closet. But it had been three years since I'd last worn the shoes, and I could barely fit three toes in them. The old lady's shoes were so big I could fit both feet in either one. I took off my socks -- sometimes I'd seen kids going by barefoot outside, but never in just socks -- and reached for the doorknob. I touched it. I stopped. I turned around again.