Her mother drifts to sleep. The girl’s dad is upstairs in his home office. He is not a mean man, not at all. He is quiet like snow and just as white. It is hard for him to smile and sometimes she hears him sniffling when she eavesdrops. She used to be angry that he wasn’t stronger. Men are supposed to be able to lift heavy weights and fix broken things. She’s not even halfway through her story, or to the good part, when Aunt Sandy comes over. The girl knows it’s her because she taps on the door like a sock puppet might, soft little nudging sounds, before just going ahead and letting herself in. She breaks into a smile when she sees the girl, then the smile goes jagged finding the girl’s mother on the sofa. Aunt Sandy puts her praying hands to the side of her face, closes her eyes and makes a sleeping motion. The girl checks her mother, and nods to her aunt. They go into the kitchen, Aunt Sandy tiptoeing so her heels don’t click. Aunt Sandy hugs the girl, whispers her nickname, “Izzy, Izzy, Izzy.” She’d prefer her aunt use Elizabeth. Izzy is reserved for the girl’s mother and a fleet of make-believe friends that she trusts. Aunt and Izzy sit at the round table with the silver siding and bruised-blue Formica top. They have dark pink fruit punch in clear glasses and Izzy imagines a cartoon fish zipping inside, burping at her and chuckling. Aunt Sandy has a long goat face with chin whiskers. She looks sad today. The girl asks what’s wrong, but before she does, Izzy decides that if Aunt Sandy tells the truth, then it will mean she really can trust the woman. Aunt Sandy shakes her head, the eyes flicking for an answer, and the girl looks at her lap knowing it doesn’t matter now what answer’s given because it’ll just be a lie, no different than the ones her father and the doctors tell. Izzy’s heard the word a thousand times. With each utterance, though, one of the adults will introduce the term as if it’s thin crystal or a hot cake out of the oven. “Depression isn’t forever, Izzy. Besides, there are new medicines,” Aunt Sandy says. “Your mom’s going to get better.” Then Auntie asks would Izzy like to come live with her for a while, hmm? She reaches across for the girl’s palms. Izzy lets her have them and thinks, “Cold hands, warm heart,” but if that’s so, then the reverse must be true, and she snatches her hands back. “Hey!” Aunt Sandy says.
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