Chapter 21: He Was Only Sixteen

“Where are you hurt?”

“I don’t know.” Rosalie cries harder. “My stomach hurts too.”

Her classmate finally understands.

“Rosie, I think you got your period.”

Rosalie lifts her tear-streaked face, completely lost.

“It happens to every girl,” her classmate explains gently. She searches her bag while giving Rosalie a hurried explanation. “I don’t have a pad. I can ask someone else.”

Adrian visibly relaxes.

He catches the only part that matters: Rosalie needs a pad.

Judging by her expression, she would rather disappear than let more people know.

“I’ll buy them.”

The final bell at their Manhattan private school rang only minutes ago.

Students are still crowding the halls on their way to practice and club meetings when Adrian shoulders his backpack and runs from the building.

A pharmacy sits across the street.

He stops in front of the menstrual-care aisle and discovers an alarming number of choices.

Regular. Overnight. Ultra-thin. Maxi. Wings.

He reads every label. When he turns one package over and finds illustrated instructions, his ears turn red. He flips it back at once.

In the end, Adrian buys one of everything, adds a package of wipes, and runs back with the entire haul stuffed into his backpack.

Rosalie has stopped crying.

Her classmate has convinced her that she is not sick, though she still refuses to look at him.

Adrian asks no questions.

He removes his navy school blazer and ties it around her waist, covering the back of her plaid skirt. Then he wipes the blood from her chair.

“Can you walk?”

Rosalie nods.

She is pale and unsteady on the way to the girls’ restroom.

Adrian wants to carry her, but she refuses, so he stays beside her and keeps checking her face.

At the restroom door, Rosalie slips inside.

Adrian is about to remind her that he still has the pads when the door opens a few inches. A small hand reaches through the gap.

“Adrian, give me one.”

“Oh.”

He opens his backpack and stares at the packages.

“Regular or overnight? Ultra-thin or maxi?”

Silence comes from behind the door.

“Overnight,” Rosalie finally whispers. “Maxi.”

Adrian finds the right package, opens it, and places one pad in her hand.

“I’ll wait here. If you don’t know how to use it, tell—”

A lock clicks.

Adrian returns to the present.

The bathroom door opens, and Rosalie stands there, one hand resting against the frame.

“Why are you still here?”

“Waiting for you.”

She looks calmer, though one hand still hovers near her abdomen.

Adrian bends and lifts her. Too tired to protest, she circles his neck with her arms and rests against him.

The bathroom is only a few steps from the living room.

Adrian turns the walk into nearly a full minute.

When he reaches the sofa, Rosalie tightens her hold.

“Not there. I stained it.”

Her gaze falls on the dark patch left on the deep-gold leather.

Adrian carries her to a nearby armchair. After settling her down, he kisses her cheek several times in quick succession.

She tolerates the first few, then pushes his face away.

“Clean the sofa.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Adrian wipes the leather until the stain disappears.

When he looks back, Rosalie is watching his hands, her cheeks growing pink. She slowly hides behind a cushion.

So she is shy.

His smile spreads before he can stop it. However old she gets, some part of Rosalie will always be the girl who used to follow him everywhere.

His girl.

“Lie down. I’ll make you something warm.”

“Okay.”

He covers her with a blanket, rolls his sleeves to his elbows, and heads toward the kitchen.

A low hum rises from the vent hood.

The kitchen opens directly into the living room, separated only by a long marble island. F

rom the armchair, Rosalie can see Adrian warming tomato soup on the stove while buttering two slices of sourdough for grilled cheese.

The cramp gradually eases.

She watches him move between the island and the stove, his white shirt still rumpled, the sleeves rolled to his elbows.

Then he lays the bread in a skillet.

Rosalie’s eyes begin to sting.

The first time she saw Adrian cook for himself, he was making the same meal.

That summer, Aunt Helen died.

Uncle Peter had been gone for a little over two years. Adrian had turned fourteen the day Uncle Peter died. He was sixteen when he lost Aunt Helen.

After the funeral, relatives came and went, handling hospital bills, the estate, and guardianship arrangements.

Whenever the adults needed Adrian present, he appeared. When they placed paperwork in front of him, he signed where they pointed.

He was so quiet and cooperative that everyone seemed to forget he was sixteen.

That Friday afternoon, Rosalie arrived at the Mercer home with her backpack.

Adrian tutored her every Friday.

He had skipped two grades and still ranked first in the senior class, while her own grades gave her father plenty to worry about.

Rosalie knew no one would remember their lesson that week.

She came anyway.

She had not seen Adrian since the funeral.

After ringing the bell several times, she entered the security code she had memorized years ago.

The house looked exactly as it always had. That somehow made the silence worse.

“Adrian?”

No answer.

She walked farther inside and heard a pan scrape against the stove.

The kitchen opened into the family room.

Adrian stood alone at the island, spreading butter across a slice of bread with stiff, careful strokes.

A can of tomato soup sat open beside the stove, and the first sandwich was already burned black around the edges.

He had set out one plate.

One bowl.

One spoon.

Rosalie stopped at the edge of the kitchen.

The house had been full of adults all week, yet no one had stayed long enough to ask whether he had eaten.

So Adrian was learning to feed himself.