My therapist says it’s normal for people to touch themselves. Ew, not like that. I mean, not sexually. She says it’s not weird, and that feels like the permission slip I need to do it whenever I can. I touch my knobby knees. I never feel like they point in the right direction. I poke my thighs and watch the skin jiggle until I get up to my hipbones. They jut right out. My dad says hugging me is no fun, it’s like he’s getting stabbed in the gut. I wrap my middle finger and thumb around my wrist and go up my arm like that until my fingers no longer touch. I can go almost up to my elbow. Part of me wants to be able to go past my elbow, but I’ve always had big arms. I avoid my stomach. It’s this vast and kind of unruly white space that never seems to do what I want it to do. My boobs…I have no boobs. My dad has bigger boobs than I do, which is kind of embarrassing for both of us in my opinion.

“Hannah!”

That’s my dad, roaring at me from the bottom of the stairs, as usual. It’s my sister’s thirtieth birthday, so we’re going to the fanciest steakhouse in town. I whined and complained already, but there’s no getting out of it. I checked out the restaurant’s menu ahead of time and wrote down the salad I want with all the things I want them to take off of it.

“Hannah Banana!”

You know those childhood nicknames that never seem to crawl away and die like they should?

“I’m coming!”

“I don’t hear you moving!”

“That’s because I’m like a cat in the night!”

I’m pretty light on my feet, and I’m proud of that. My dad’s weight announces his presence wherever he goes.

“Hey, Miss Cat in the Night! Get down here.”

That’s my sister, Jen. Oh no, that means…

“Auntie Banana! Auntie Banana!”

The brats, I mean, my nephews are here. They refuse to call me Aunt Hannah like dignified children would. They can’t even say Banana like five year olds should. It’s baNAnnnA.

I take my time going down the stairs. I stop by the table in the hallway. It’s an antique Dad inherited from some old aunt. It’s heavy, made of real solid wood with cherubs lining the legs. There’s an open envelope lying on the top. We’re not supposed to put anything on that table, so I pick it up to move it downstairs. Then, I notice it’s from Dad’s doctor. I move back down the hall toward my room and pull out the test results inside. Dad’s cholesterol is still high. No surprise there. But his glucose is slightly elevated too. Does this mean Dad has diabetes? My chest hurts. After a couple more shouts of “Auntie Banana,” I put the envelope back and head downstairs.

It seems kind of unfair that life, or at least adolescence, is about getting away from my parents, but the older I get, the more I seem to carry them along.

When I meet my family at the bottom of the stairs, I notice my sister looks older. I guess single motherhood can do that to a person. Other than the whole looking old thing, my sister could be my twin. We have the same long reddish-blonde hair and brown eyes. We’re the same height, about average. And we both have our father’s cheeks and our mother’s nose and hips. No matter how much the rest of me shrinks, I can’t seem to get rid of my father’s cheeks or my mother’s hips. It seems kind of unfair that life, or at least adolescence, is about getting away from my parents, but the older I get, the more I seem to carry them along.

“That’s a nice skirt. A little short though, don’t you think, Dad?” Jen turns to him.

Dad shrugs.

“Happy Birthday,” I say as I hug her. She grunts when my hip hits her side.

“Geez, Han. Good thing we’re going to the steakhouse. You need to put some meat on those bones. That’s the goal, right?”

That’s actually not the goal of treatment, or at least not the only goal. But Jen doesn’t get that. And pointing out the hip bones? So not necessary.

I gently run a finger along the side of her face. “Those wrinkles, babe, you really should do something about them.”

I turn away from her real quick before I see her hurt look and I start to feel bad. But I end up turning right into my father’s glare. His dirty looks never last long though. He’s basically Santa Claus. Round face, huge cheeks, overflowing girth, fat legs, and black boots. He’s always wearing black boots. He almost went to Scotland in college but couldn’t afford the trip. Ever since then, he’s collected kilts. Half his closet—what used to be Mom’s half—is full of kilts. Dress kilts, casual kilts, hunting kilts, camping kilts, dancing kilts. The only reason he’s not wearing a kilt this night is because my sister forbids it. He wears them “regimental style.” That’s code for commando. My sister doesn’t want her kids getting the wrong idea. Can’t say I blame her.

I do all the laundry for both Dad and me. He wouldn’t know what to do with fabric softener if the directions kissed him on the lips. And I’ve never seen underwear in his hamper… I try not to think about that too hard.

Dad hugs me. Whoever came up with the term “bear hug” must have been hugged by my father at some point. His hugs are tight and overpowering. It’s like he’s trying to fill me with love from the outside in. “I love you,” he says. But I hear: Fighting makes me uncomfortable.

When he pulls away, one look at Jen’s face tells me she got a similar hug, probably longer and harder, since it’s her birthday, so I shouldn’t complain.

“Let’s go!” He says, looking from me to Jen and back at me. “To the car!”

The boys, Mark and Matthew, run out the front door to Dad’s truck. “Han, you and Jen can ride together. I’ll take the boys.”

It’s a punishment, I know. I try to think of a way to smooth things over with my sister. We walk side by side, our arms almost touching. I look down and wonder exactly how much bigger her arm is than mine. When I first look at it, I think hers is twice as big, but when I look for a little longer, it’s like my arm starts to grow until I can’t really tell a difference. I just stop looking.

“I’ve always wanted to go to this steakhouse. At some point, I’m going to have to get some man to take me there on a date because I would like to actually have a drink there. They get their beer from local breweries.”

This is the first time we’ve celebrated Jen’s birthday since Mom died almost a year ago, so I’m trying to be polite. We each responded to my mom’s death in a different way. Jen got all control freaky. She’s never broken a rule, not even jay-walked. Her kids are out of control and her ex-husband is out of control, but I think that’s because she tries so hard to control them. Rebellious buggers. Dad got overly affectionate, like smothering us with love. I guess the opposite would be worse. But once you hear “I love you” a thousand times a day, it starts sounding like “I need you” or “Don’t leave me.”

And me? I got skinny. I got skinny to the point that I was passing out. And then, there was an incident at a breakfast fundraiser thing at school. I threw all the bacon into a dumpster and set it on fire. The school made my father force me into treatment. That’s where I learned bacon is a trigger food, but I don’t tell anyone that because, really, who in the real world has trigger foods?

Food killed my mother. No, wait, I’m not supposed to say that. Therapist’s “orders.” Food didn’t kill my mother. Her lack of self-control around food did. I’m not supposed to say that either, but it’s true.

Here’s the party line: my mother died from complications from diabetes involving her kidneys. She was on dialysis for three years before kidney failure tragically took her life.

Here’s my line: my mother ate herself to death. She got type 2 diabetes even without being at high risk because her eating was out of control. The diabetes destroyed her body.

Mom died less than a year ago, and she was sick for years before that. I can only remember her as a sick, fat person.

When we get to the steakhouse, I can smell grease and fat from the parking lot. Okay, I don’t really know if you can smell fat, but whatever they are cooking with smells disgusting.

When we get out of the car, Dad is sniffing the air. “Smell that, honey? Smell that? That’s what heaven smells like.”

I roll my eyes.

“I love you,” he says. What he means is: don’t act up.

Once we are sitting at the table, Mark and Matthew start fighting over the crayons for their menus. Jen manages to ignore them for a full five minutes before separating the pile of crayons into two separate camps. I’m glad she said something because I was about to snap on both boys.

I never open my menu. But I can’t help but notice the food that goes by our table: a double helping of mashed potatoes, broccoli with a slab of butter in the middle, rare steaks, huge steaks, steak strips. My chest starts to constrict. I can’t eat here. Whatever they cook will surely be dripping with butter and other unnecessary calories that could kill me.

“What are you going to get?” Jen asks. I’m thankful. Her question pulls me out of my head and reminds me that I have a plan.

“A salad,” I reply.

“Just a salad? Why don’t you try one of the small steaks?”

“No thanks.” I rummage in my purse looking for a piece of gum. Chewing calms me down.

“Oh come on, Han. It’s my birthday. We’re all getting steak. One steak isn’t going to kill you.”

Jen never went to the family meetings I had in the treatment center. She didn’t learn that she isn’t supposed to push me. Dad figures as long as I’m eating something, everything is fine and there’s no need to adjust anyone else’s behavior.

“I’m getting a salad.”

“But what about this steak right here. It’s in thin strips on top of a bed of cooked spinach. Doesn’t that sound healthy and yummy?”

I groan, look around, and spot our waitress just in time. She is one of those goody-two-shoes types who is probably only sixteen and already working to save up for college. I can just tell. The way her hair is pulled back in a high ponytail with a scrunchie. I didn’t even know they still made scrunchies. Her fingernails are all painted the same pale pink. Who paints all their fingernails the same color anymore, other than old people?

She gave us the usual spiel: “Hi, my name is Amber and I’ll be your server today. What can I get for you?” Her ponytail pops after every word, like it’s adding punctuation. She places a basket of breadsticks on the table. Each of the boys grabs two before anyone can say something. I smile and wish they will eat all of them before anyone can ask me if I want one.

I order their Garden Salad Supreme without the potatoes, the meat, the dried cranberries, the croutons, the fried onions, and with the dressing on the side. Jen glares at me. She and Dad order the special of the day: a twelve ounce steak with two sides. Jen chooses broccoli and mashed potatoes. Dad chooses two baked potatoes.

“I’d like both of those loaded, please.” Dad puts all our menus in a pile.

“Loaded?” The waitress puckers her lips out.

“Yes. With bacon, sour cream, chives, cheddar cheese, and maybe a little bit of onion.”

“Oh. We don’t have bacon.” I can’t take my eyes off of her ponytail. It has a mind of its own.

“What do you mean you don’t have bacon?” Dad asks. He asks it a little loudly in my opinion. But Jen doesn’t seem to mind. He laughs a little, like the waitress is playing a mean joke on him. “You mean you don’t usually put bacon on the baked potatoes. That’s okay, dear. Make it a special order.”

“No, sir, I mean we don’t actually have bacon in this restaurant.”

“At all?”

“Dad, please calm down. Or at least quiet down,” Jen says.

See? I told you he was being loud.

“Fine.” He folds his arms over his Santa belly and stares at the waitress. “Do you at least have sour cream and butter?”

“Yes, sir, we do. I’ll make sure I bring that out with your baked potato.”

Dad turns his attention to the twins, his way of avoiding his anger. Or, more likely, his way of avoiding the judgment of his daughters.

“Do you want a breadstick?” Jen asks.

“No, thank you.” I reply. My back stiffens, preparing for the fight to come.

She bristles but decides not to push it. I exhale.

She turns to me with this bounce like we’re best friends. “So, Han, what’s going on in your life?”

“What do you mean?” I’m not doing the best friend bounce.

“I mean, what’s going on in the world of Hannah?”

Was that actually meant to be a more specific question? “Nothing much. School.”

“It’s your senior year, isn’t it? Are you still making up credits?”

I can’t believe she’s bringing this up. I had to take a couple months off of school in the beginning of the year, half a year after Mom died, because of the bacon incident and the passing out. That’s when the therapist came in with her Marching Orders for Food and Life. She doesn’t like it when I call them that. But I think that’s just too bad for her. I “graduated” from treatment three months ago.

“I was never making up credits, Jen. I still completed my homework while I was out of school. Took tests and everything.”

“How’d you do that if you weren’t in school? Like if no one was teaching you?”

“I taught myself the stuff,” I mumbled. It wasn’t really something I liked to admit. I really like school. But from October through January, I didn’t need teachers to understand the work.

Jen just nods. This is why I hate telling people this stuff. It’s like suddenly people have nothing to say. But she had plenty to say when she thought I was struggling to keep up. Like just because I spent a couple months in “treatment,” I’m supposed to be broken.

“You look good,” Jen says after a moment.

I want to ask her her motivations. But socially competent people aren’t supposed to do that. I smile and pretend I’m not suspicious.

I wonder why she says it. Is she fishing for a compliment? Trying to get me to say, “oh thanks, you look good too”? Or is she confused by my eating habits? Does she think all I want is to look a certain way so somehow validating that I “look good” will make me want to eat? I want to ask her her motivations. But socially competent people aren’t supposed to do that. I smile and pretend I’m not suspicious.

“Thanks.” I say it even though I don’t mean it.

The waitress comes back with our food. When she places Dad’s steak in front of him with two large baked potatoes on either side of the meat, Dad gets to his feet.

“I’ll be back.”

I figure he’s going to the bathroom, and so I don’t look up from the salad I’m poking when he comes back.

“Dad, seriously?” Jen says.

My head snaps up, and my mouth drops open. I actually can’t keep my lips together. “What are you doing?” I know I’m loud. I know it. And the look on Jen’s face confirms it.

But you have to understand: my father came back into the restaurant with a chilled pack of bacon.

“Did you seriously go to the store?”

“I had it in my truck.” He grins, and I know he’s proud of himself. I can’t believe it. He rips the packet open and takes out seven strips of bacon. He starts ripping the bacon into pieces and mushing it into his potatoes.

My lip curls to the left. My hands start to tingle with anxiety and frustration. Bacon, seriously? What is he thinking? Is he trying to be like—

A picture forms. Mom on the couch. Her swollen ankles propped up on an ottoman.

And I am cuddled next to her on the couch while we watched some Disney movie. I had missed most of the movie because I had to get stuff for Mom. She couldn’t move around well by that point. I had just gotten her a glass of water and some gorilla in the movie was complaining about something. Before that, I got her a magazine and cookies. Before that, it was ice cream. Before that, it was her pills and a Coke.

Finally, the oven beeped. “Can you get that for me, baby?”

I was nine years old at the time, and that night for dinner, it was just me and Mom. Dad was still at work, and Jen was doing school stuff. We were having thirty-two wieners wrapped in bacon. I had prepared them myself. I took out two plates. On one plate, I set aside five small wieners for me. The rest was for Mom.

When I think back now about watching her eat all that bacon, it makes my stomach turn. I watch Dad basically doing the same thing, going everywhere with bacon in his truck, like he can’t be separated from it for a single moment. And I’m the unhealthy one?

Doesn’t he know that bacon is what landed me in treatment to begin with? Doesn’t he know that I hate it? Oh wait. I shake my head. He doesn’t know. I didn’t tell him that. And Dad’s not the kind of guy to pick up on subtle hints or clues. He has to be told stuff directly. What I told him when I left treatment three months ago is that I couldn’t be better, that I’ve been cured. I didn’t actually think he would believe me. I grunt and cross my arms over my chest. My whole family is clueless, and I’ve lost my appetite.

Dad winks and says, “I love you.” What I hear is: calm down.

I don’t say anything for the rest of the dinner. You may not believe this, but I really did try to think of something to say. I don’t want to be a drag at my sister’s birthday dinner. I mean, it’s kind of pathetic that she was spending her birthday with me and Dad instead of friends or a husband. I don’t want to make her feel any worse. Plus, she’s thirty. I’m trying to be nice, but can’t get the image of Mom and the bacon out of my head.

Dad finishes the whole pack of bacon while he and Jen sit and talk. Jen doesn’t seem bothered by it at all.

When I get home, I go straight to my room. Dad and Jen stay and talk long after Mark and Matthew fall asleep. I hear their voices murmuring and every so often Dad tries not to laugh too loud and fails. On my bed, I touch my arms, squeezing from wrist to shoulder. I reach down. I think I have longer than average arms. My fingers grab my toes and then the balls of my feet. I lean back and rest my hands on my thighs until the house is silent. I realize my hands are touching my body, but I don’t feel my body. I’m here but not here.

Then, I do something I haven’t done since before “treatment.” I tiptoe downstairs with a notebook and pen ready in my hands. I take inventory of all the food in the house, except the spices. I can’t explain why, but the spices don’t seem important. There’s nothing out of the ordinary—chicken breast, frozen broccoli, canned soup, canned peas. The list goes on and on and is three pages long by the time I’m done, and notice something’s missing.

I creep out to the garage. I know Dad has an extra freezer out here, but this is his man space, so I’m rarely in it. He’s changed it around since the last time I brought him a beer during a football game. The television is larger and flatter than before. The couch is leather and there are two overstuffed recliners, also leather. The freezer is all the way in the corner. I stare at it from across the room. I can’t tell you how I know, but I know what I’m looking for is in it.

But even though I know what I know, I’m not prepared for what I see. Every shelf, from the top to the bottom, is filled with bacon. Boxes and boxes of bacon, like he bought it in bulk from one of those discount-buy-in-bulk stores. I don’t move for a while.

I stop thinking. My therapist says this happens sometimes. People stop thinking and just end up feeling all their feelings. My feelings push me closer to the freezer. My feelings push me to grab a box off of the top shelf. My feelings prompt me to open the box and stick a whole pack in Dad’s personal microwave. Once it’s thawed, I double check to make sure it’s really ready. And then I start.

*     *     *

By the time the sun comes up, I feel nothing. That’s not true. There’s a mild tingling in my toe. I’m on the leather couch, surrounded by boxes of bacon. The freezer is about half empty. I shove another three slices in my mouth at once and chew slowly.

To say food is complicated would be an understatement. In this moment, I want my father to understand that I will sacrifice myself to keep him around. I can’t lose another parent. Not any time soon.

I’m surprised I’m not nauseous. Or maybe I am, and I just don’t know it yet? I lean back against the couch, and that’s when I see the picture of Mom. She’s on the beach, her toes buried in the sand, a white cover-up shrouds her body from her shoulders to her knees. She’s smiling at the camera. My mom had a pretty face. She was the only one in the family with blue eyes, and they were a deep blue, like jewels. Her round, high cheekbones naturally had a rosy tint, so she never needed blush. Her skin was clear, smooth, and radiant. It used to make me mad when people would say that, you know? Like that’s what you say about fat people: she has a pretty face. But in my mom’s case, it was true. She did have a pretty face.

I remember that day at the beach. Even though it hurt, she rolled around in the sand with us for hours. We made a sand castle that was actually big enough for me to sit in and pretend to be a princess. She would always tell me she loved me. And it didn’t sound like anything else.

I open my eyes.

“What did you do?” Dad bellows.

“I am saving you.”

“What?”

“You’re diabetic.”

“No, sweetheart. That was Mom.” He looks at me in confusion.

“But the test?” I open my eyes again and try to sit up, but I can’t. It’s like I’m stuck.

“How much did she eat?”

Oh great, Jen is here. I can tell from her tone that she’s judging me and feeling a little superior. I’m too tired to argue even in my head.

Then, the pain sets in. I start to moan. The stabbing begins, it travels from one side to the other and back again. Then it moves to my belly button and stays there, stabbing, over and over.

“We’ve got to get her to the hospital.” I don’t know who says it. I close my eyes, wishing that my body wouldn’t be my body for a little while longer.

The next hour is a bumpy one. I bump in my dad’s arms as he carries me to the car. I bump in the car as we travel over speed tables. I bump on the raised yellow thingies when they wheel me into the emergency room. I bump as they push the gurney down the hallway. After all the bumps, when it’s quiet, my body leaves again. Peace.

When I open my eyes, I feel empty. Or more accurately, I feel emptied out. My mouth feels funny. I reach up and rub against it. When I pull my hand away, it’s covered in black stuff. Charcoal. They must have pumped my stomach. Dad is sitting in the chair across from me, tossing something in his mouth but I can’t tell what it is. He’s wearing his comfy kilt. They are his equivalent of comfy sweatpants.

My voice croaks, whatever they gave me makes my throat hurt. “I love you.” But I mean: don’t leave me.

Jasmine Evans is a writer and curriculum designer from the San Francisco Bay Area. She is earning her MFA in Creative Writing at Mills College. Her short stories have appeared in The Copperfield Review, Heater, and Bread for God’s Children. When she’s not working on a story or article, she loves to browse used bookstores for gems and play with her cat, Yuki.

No amount of pleading or pain meds could stop Mr. Villanueva from yowling like a depressed cat at night. After his roommate threatened to sue the hospital for emotional distress, the nurses decided that Mr. Villanueva deserved a private room. From that came my first candy striper assignment to convert Room 128, which stored pumps, IVs, and lots of other fancy get-well equipment. When the novelty of my tasks wore off, I made a game out of seeing how close the pump stands could get to the service elevator after one good shove down the empty hall, and whistled while hauling the empty shelving to the basement. I didn’t think annoying the nurses a little was that big a deal, until one of them pulled me aside.

Her badge said Maya, a name that complemented her doughy body and velvet-black eyes while underscoring the sharpness of her words. “How would you feel, Haylee, about having to spend your sick days alone in a closet?”

“But how will he know it’s a closet after I convert it?” I countered.

“Normal rooms have windows.”

“Yeah, but there’s nothing to see besides a parking lot and a cornfield.”

“You’ve got a lot to learn, child. How do you know if the sun’s up or down without a window?”

I hesitated, unsure if she wanted an answer or an apology for something I didn’t think was my fault. “Why are we moving him then?”

“Construction of the long-term care wing has been postponed ‘til the state thaws the funding or the Browns win the Super Bowl, whichever comes first.” Maya frowned. “Paying patients get priority.”

“Is that legal?”

Maya shushed me. “That’s not the kind of thing you yell out in a hospital.”

“I wasn’t yelling—”

“All the same. Just work a lot quieter, child. Please.”

After I finished cleaning out Room 128, I stood in there for a long while, imagining myself bedridden. The room felt smaller than before, like an empty shoebox. The longer I stared, the more I saw the shelves I just removed; faint smoky lines striped the white walls like an old prison uniform. I wondered if all the studying needed to become a doctor would be worth all the money my father seemed to think I’d want.

Over dinner that night, I told my father about Mr. Villanueva’s new room and asked what I should do.

“Damn straight that ain’t fair,” he said. “Being the only hospital in town don’t give them the right to do whatever. That man’s family should file a complaint.”

“He doesn’t seem to have a family. Or, at least, no one visits him.”

“That’s a shame.”

“Yeah, I know. The nurses say Mr. Villanueva doesn’t have any insurance either.”

“Aha, now I see the crook in the river.” My father’s face hardened with a sudden fierceness. “Don’t you waste your mind worrying about him. You just worry about you. I’ll bet the closet he’s getting is cleaner than any hospital room back where he snuck over from.”

I flinched, still not used to the anger that often engulfed him since the factory shutdown. My father wasn’t good at being idle, not even after six months of practice.

You’d better listen to me, Haylee, and soak up as much Spanish as you can before you graduate and get the hell out of here.

“You’d better listen to me, Haylee, and soak up as much Spanish as you can before you graduate and get the hell out of here. Everything’s cheaper in Costa Rica, so that’s where the world’s moving to. ’Cause the quality inspection’s always better when it’s cheaper.” He snorted and took a swig of his beer. “Guess you can go there if you’re still dead set on being a starving artist. Live off the coconuts or bananas or whatever grows free on the trees.”

I started to point out that my portrait of him won first prize at the last county fair, but he whooped at the television. The Browns had scored a winning touchdown against the Steelers, and a rare smile from my father filled the kitchen. He didn’t need to hear any more about my problems when he’d momentarily forgotten his own.

*     *     *

A few days later, the hospital pronounced Room 128 inhabitable and Mr. Villanueva disappeared inside it. The nurses kept saying how he was much more manageable during the night shift, and I gathered that they liked his new distance from their station. During the evenings I volunteered, whenever his room number lit up on the switchboard, they took their time answering him. Although he called them all the time, he rarely asked for anything other than ice cream, something they allowed him only once a day. It didn’t surprise me when he finally went on a hunger strike about a week after his move. But I couldn’t believe what Maya wanted to do about it.

“Haylee’s nice and young enough to be his daughter,” she said to the other nurses, “and he hasn’t had a chance to not like her yet. Let her try to feed him tomorrow.”

I didn’t want to do it. Taking water and Jell-O to cooperative patients was one thing, while trying to stick a spoonful of mashed potatoes in Mr. Villanueva’s mouth was another. How could I deal with a stranger’s anger when I wanted to hide from my father’s? Still, I couldn’t say no when it seemed that everyone else had already given up on him.

That Saturday, I brought Mr. Villanueva his breakfast. His room was dim except for the bright glare of the local news on the television, the only decoration on the otherwise naked white walls. While I set up his food tray and a chair for myself near his bed, he glanced at me with disinterest before shifting his gaze back to the nothingness on his right. Where a window might normally be.

“The sky’s so cloudy, it looks like evening already,” I said. “It’s supposed to rain all day.”

He looked at me fully and—though he appeared doubtful of my weather report—I felt encouraged. I realized then that he wasn’t as old as I originally thought. His brown face carried heavy bags under his eyes but no wrinkles, and gray dusted the black hair above his ears. Almost every part of him, from his nose to his shoulders, sloped down as though burdened by a weight I couldn’t see. Ignoring his gauntness, I put him in his late thirties or early forties, around my father’s age.

I filled his fork with scrambled eggs. “Can I help you eat?”

He turned away before I could even lift the fork.

“You’ll get sicker if you don’t eat something besides ice cream.”

His cracked lips thinned into a tight line of resistance.

“Mr. Villanueva? Please eat.”

Without meeting my eyes, he shook his head. I offered the melon slices and toast from his plate, but he refused all of it. He even snubbed the apple juice I brought him because he rebuffed the milk that came with his meal. After an hour of gridlock, I trudged back to the nurses’ station thinking that was the end of it. I didn’t like failing, but I disliked rejection even more.

“Least he didn’t splatter the walls,” Maya said, laughing. The others agreed and decided that I should try to feed Mr. Villanueva again, in spite of my open dismay. Frustrated, I took twice as long of a morning break, but no one seemed to notice.

When I failed to persuade Mr. Villanueva to eat lunch, the nurses punished us both by sending me to Room 128 with his dinner. By then I decided that my time in there shouldn’t be a total letdown. I found the television remote and began channel surfing for something decent to watch while he ignored me.

“Por favor, stop!”

I dropped the remote, shocked by the weak rasp of his voice.

“Go back, miss. Two channels, I think.”

I did as he asked, and landed on a Spanish-speaking game show. He sat up straighter, and my father’s warning came back to me.

“Me llamo, Haylee.” I paused, internally slamming my accent and translating a plea for him to eat. “Puedas comer, por favor?”

He studied me for a moment, the corners of his mouth twitching indecisively. “You learning Spanish in school?”

“Yes—I mean, sí. At least until it gets cancelled at the end of the year.”

“You are lucky. I did not learn English until I came here for work. These”—he held out calloused, trembling hands—“were stronger then. On my father’s farm in Nicaragua, I could hold many, many sugarcane stalks together and then break them with my hands. But three weeks ago, I am trying to break a wall in a house much, much older than me, and the hammer falls from my hand. Then I fall to the floor in pain.” He caressed the plain, gold band on his ring finger. “My wife fell in love with my strength. I am happy she is too far away to see me like this.”

“Doesn’t she know you’re sick?”

“Not yet. I will tell her if I cannot send her money next month.”

“But what if you’re dead before then? And she never finds out what happened to you?” I blinked hard, horrified at how my thoughts escaped so easily. His face didn’t reflect my discomfort though, so after a moment I tried to explain myself. “My dad didn’t let me visit my mother in the hospital because he thought seeing her sick would give me nightmares. But I wouldn’t have cared what she looked like. I just hate that I had less time with her.”

“I have not seen my wife or sons in five years. It would be better for them to stay there than to waste money coming here.”

“Well, maybe you could go visit them when you’re better. Just one plane ticket can’t be that bad if you buy it on sale.”

His eyes dropped, and suddenly I realized the unspoken truth; he couldn’t fly home, not unless he never wanted to work here again. Before I could think of a way to apologize, he plucked the rye bread and the milk from his tray.

“Just this today,” he said. “Please take everything else away.”

I shuffled back to the nurses’ station, uncertain of whether I had made things better or worse. I told Maya what Mr. Villanueva took from the tray, and started to confess how I offended him, but she cut me off.

“Hey ladies,” she sang out, drawing the attention of the other nurses nearby, “Room 128 is eating! And we owe it all to our sweet Haylee!”

They rewarded me with a standing ovation, and then bombarded me with questions about how I did it. Their enthusiasm convinced me I had done good, so I announced a confident diagnosis of loneliness. By the time I finished my shift, I floated on pride.

That night, my father rolled his eyes when I bragged about my success.

“When you were little, Haylee, you’d eat black-eyed peas like there was no tomorrow when your mama fixed them. All the time, you’d clean your plate of those peas. But after she died, you wouldn’t touch them and I couldn’t figure out why. I kept scratching my head, thinking there must’ve been some secret ingredient I was missing. Then I noticed the dug up dirt in your mama’s snake plant pot.” He tapped his fingers on the kitchen table with a bittersweet expression. “You’d been squirreling those peas in your cheeks and then burying them.”

I crossed my arms in defiance. “So, you don’t believe he really ate.”

“You see him put any of it in his mouth?”

“But why would he lie?”

“Why’d you lie to your mama?”

I saw where my father was going and I hated that pessimistic place. “Why would a sick man care what a 16-year-old candy striper thinks of him?”

“He probably doesn’t. But you had to report to the nurses, didn’t you?”

“Of course. That’s my job. So what?”

“So maybe he thinks good behavior will get him what he really wants.”

“And what would that be?”

“Just wait and see, Haylee.”

*     *     *

It twisted me to think he possibly fooled me, that I might need to accept any part of the worldview thrown in my face at home.

The next morning while my father attended church, I went to the hospital, praying on the drive over that my patient would prove him wrong. I knew I wasn’t a doctor, but my mind carried a similar burden of responsibility. It twisted me to think he possibly fooled me, that I might need to accept any part of the worldview thrown in my face at home.

I hurried to Room 128, but stopped short in the doorway. My patient moaned and twisted in bed as Maya loomed over him. Her clenched fist crinkled a clear plastic bag with a tube coiled inside.

“Come now, Mr. V, nobody’s hurting you,” she said. “Least, not yet. That’s why you and I are having this little discussion, to remind you that you agreed to let us do what’s best for you when you checked yourself in here.”

“But I eat,” he cried.

“Your protein levels say otherwise. And what good do you think that’s gonna do your ailing kidneys?”

“I eat bread. Ask Señorita Haylee.”

“Then where’d the bread in your pillowcase come from?”

“I eat different bread just yesterday. Pregúntale! Go ask Señorita Haylee.”

“Mr. V, don’t you go pulling that child into this mess with any more lies. Lying won’t get you out of this room any more than refusing to eat. And like I already told you, if you don’t start putting food in your mouth with your own two hands, you’re going to force us—for your own good—to put this tube up your nose—”

“No.”

“—down your throat—”

“No!”

“—and into your belly.”

I ran out of the hospital, gagging and clutching my own gut. A few feet from the bus stop, I lost the cereal I ate for breakfast. Like a ringing in my ears, his wails trailed after me, pleading for mercy.

*     *     *

That night, the crickets kept me awake and worrying about poor Mr. Villanueva. Because I failed him, he would fail his wife. A feeling of uselessness overcame me as I sank deeper and deeper into my bed, until the mattress towered like a wall around my body and then engulfed me like a monstrous marshmallow. I woke shivering but sweaty.

With the nightmare raw on my nerves, I climbed out of bed and used the glow of my laptop screen to drive away the darkness in my bedroom. I searched the Internet for pictures of Nicaraguan sugarcane farms, wanting a glimpse of what Mr. Villanueva left behind. What I found opened my eyes to what he must really want, something inadvertently taken away from him. I grabbed my sketchbook and pencils, overwhelmed by the urge to draw a landscape both foreign and surprisingly familiar.

Before dawn broke, I headed down to the basement, where my easel and oil paints waited near the window, and began translating my graphite picture into one full of color. Reds, browns, and blacks formed the fertile earth; sugarcane stalks grew tall in greens, olives, and yellows. I cast the sun in a pool of oranges, pinks, purples, and my own shade of crimson. As the field sprouted to life beneath my brushes and fingers, so did my sense of purpose. I didn’t stop painting until the basement stairs creaked under my father’s feet.

“You better get ready for school,” he said. “Your alarm’s been ringing for a good twenty minutes. Do you realize there’s green paint all in your—Haylee, what’s this?” He stood behind me, peering at the wet canvas.

“What’s it look like?” I asked.

“The cornfield behind the hospital.” His brow wrinkled as he studied it more. “I take that back. Everything looks wilder, more alive. Like the leaves are trying to eat that path you put in the middle. It ain’t corn, is it?”

“No.”

“What is it then?”

“My imagination, mostly.”

“Do you want to hang it in the living room?”

“Thanks, Dad, but…” I hesitated, afraid to spoil his opinion of my work if I told him the whole story. “Somebody at the hospital asked me to paint this for them.”

“That’s too bad. I would’ve liked to keep this one.”

“I could make another for you.”

He nodded slowly. “I’ll let you borrow it back for the county fair then.”

*     *     *

I hung the painting where a window should be, and then waited for Mr. Villanueva to return from his tests. At first I sat in the only chair in Room 128, working off my anxiousness with bobbing knees. A while later, I moved to a spot at the nurses’ station where I could both keep busy and discretely peer down the hallway at all the elevator traffic.

By the time my shift ended, so had the heady anticipation I brought with me to the hospital that morning. Instead, I worried that all the time I spent painting and planning the best way to sneak my gift into the hospital would be for nothing. Someone would take down the picture before Mr. Villanueva could see it.

As I trudged down the hall to leave, I noticed a low whine, like the slow stroking of a violin string that needed tuning, coming from Room 128. The sound became more melodious as I drew closer. Peering inside the room, I saw Mr. Villanueva propped up in his bed and singing to my painting. His face shone wet in the lamplight. Embarrassed that I interrupted such a private moment, I started to walk away but he locked eyes with me.

“You make this?”

“Yes,” I whispered, stepping just inside the doorway. “It’s supposed to be your father’s sugarcane farm.”

“So it is. I can see the sun setting with the same beautiful colors I remember. I miss walking in the field with my wife while she laughs at my singing. In the other room, I could pretend the corn outside was sugarcane and that my wife can hear me sing. I wanted to tell the nurses, but…how could they understand?” His gaze stretched past me, possibly returning to the home he missed, before coming back to me with a nostalgic smile. “Gracias, for my window.”

I nodded, unable to speak around the lump in my throat.

“You look too sad, Señorita Haylee. Please sit, and let me sing for you.”

Although I didn’t understand any of the words, I loved the way his voice trembled like a leaf rustling in the wind. I remember it every time I see a cornfield. Or taste something sweet.

Danielle Burnette—an engineer by day, a writer by night—lives with her husband and children in northern California. Her first contemporary Young Adult novel, The Spanish Club, was published in the summer of 2014. Between penning more works of short fiction, she is currently editing her second novel. Visit her at www.danielleburnette.com.

The dictionary tells us that a Blue Moon is the second full moon to occur in one month, a rather rare thing. But in the land of stories, a Blue Moon can mean something much more rare. Something very exciting indeed.

*     *     *

Four hundred twenty nine years ago, in a snug little village not too far from here, there lived two women—Sigrun and Hulda. They had not one friend between them, yet their names were known throughout the land. No one had escaped the acid of their tongues, and every villager knew of their bitter arguments and dislike for one another. They would stop any traveler, interrupt any chatting pair of friends, run up to any neighbor working in her fields or sweeping his cottage, each to complain about the other. The village folk dreaded the sight of them.

“Hulda thinks she is better than you, good sir,” Sigrun would say. “With her little bit of money—ptoo!—she fancies herself better than all of us. It is awful to be her next-door neighbor, simply awful. She never stops talking and must always have the last word.”

“Do you know, gentle lady, how much that Sigrun brags?” Hulda would say. “With her two goats—feh!—and that loathsome cheese she makes, she fancies herself better than all of us. She is a terrible neighbor, simply terrible. She never stops talking and must always have the last word.”

The good village folk, tired of Sigrun and Hulda’s nastiness, put their heads together and hatched an idea. They chose Hinrik, a kind man who liked to see people smile, to explain their plan to the two women. He stood in the path between their cottages. Sigrun and Hulda each stood behind her own gate.

Hinrik had to shout. “You are not happy as next-door neighbors. It will be better if you see and think about each other less. The village folk want to help, so we are ready to purchase a small parcel of land on the other side of the village. A lovely parcel. We will all work together to build a fine new cottage there, but you must decide which of you will live in it.”

Alas, the two women could only argue and bicker, bicker and argue, each more concerned with the other’s unhappiness than with her own contentment. They took turns making the same arguments against each other.

“You move to the new house,” said one.

“And leave this lovely bit of woods to you? I will not!” said the other.

“I’ll go to the new cottage,” said one.

“And take a cottage that might be better than mine? Oh no you won’t!” said the other.

And so it went. After a while, the village folk gave up in despair.

*     *     *

She took tiny tiptoe steps toward the frog, looking this way and that, until she stood beside him, hands over her mouth, eyes all but popping from her head.

One day, when Sigrun was near a pond deep in the woods, gathering fiddleheads for her supper, she saw an amazing sight. At the edge of a lush glade filled with ferns of every shade of green in the world—plus two more—was a large blue frog like no other. He was clothed in purple velvet breeches and a golden brocade vest nearly iridescent in its splendor. On his tiny feet were boots of vermilion tooled leather and over his shoulders flowed a translucent patchwork cape of shimmering jewel-toned silks. He lay back on the pond’s mossy bank, his froggy hands behind his head, basking in the warmth of the lemony sunshine. For once, Sigrun was speechless. She took tiny tiptoe steps toward the frog, looking this way and that, until she stood beside him, hands over her mouth, eyes all but popping from her head.

“Good morning, gentle lady,” said the frog. “Please do not be afraid. I won’t hurt you.”

“My eyes,” said Sigrun, “do they deceive me?”

“No, dear lady, they do not. I am the Blue Frog of the Blue Moon. Perhaps you have heard of me?” And he smiled, looking almost humble.

“Never in my life!” said Sigrun.

“No?” He pursed his froggy lips. “Well, that is as it may be. I do, after all, emerge from this pond only once in a Blue Moon. This night there will be a Blue Moon, so here I am.”

“Do you come to do dark magic?” asked Sigrun in a whisper, knitting her scraggly brows and hunching her shoulders. “To curse our village or our crops?”

“No, no, dear lady, no! On the contrary. I sit and wait for the first human who sees me.”

Sigrun gasped and backed away.

He gave a froggy chuckle. “So that I may grant that lucky soul three wishes. And do come back. It strains my voice to shout so. Surely if I had wanted to harm you I would have done it by now.”

Sigrun edged closer to the frog. “Three wishes, you say?”

“Yes indeed. Whatever you might desire, I shall give you.”

Sigrun thought for a moment, and then said, “I am ready.”

The frog’s eyes grew as large as lily pads. “Wouldn’t you care to take some time? To think it over? I will be here until midnight. You have my solemn word.”

Sigrun folded her arms and scowled. “No.”

“Very well. I’ll try not to be grumpy,” he grumped, “even if your haste does spoil my fun.”

“For my first wish, I want to have the most beautiful house in the world right in the middle of the village square, a house of magnificent finery.” Greed narrowed her eyes to small piggy slits.

“Done,” said the frog.

“You mean—it is there? Right now?”

“Indeed.”

Sigrun rubbed her hands together. “So you say, but I shall believe it when I see it. Now, for my second wish, there is a woman in my village—I want you to grant her whatever she asks.”

“You are giving a wish away?” said the frog. “Why, no one has ever done that! This must be a very special friend.”

“Bah!” said Sigrun. “Hulda is no friend. She is a terrible woman who will wish for the most lavish of riches.”

“Then, my dear woman, why?”

“Because here is my third wish,” said Sigrun. “Whatever Hulda wishes, I want the same, but three times more. You will grant this wish to me one minute—no longer!—after you grant hers.”

“But,” said the frog, “are you sure? You could have enormous riches, or the power to fly or to swim like a magnificent frog. You could even wish for good manners. Anything you dream of could be yours.”

Sigrun was twitchy with delight. “Her rage will be sweet enough to make up for one hundred lost wishes.” She smiled a most unsmiling smile.

“Well,” said the frog, “I suppose I must do as you ask.”

“So you have told me,” said Sigrun. “Now to think of a way to get her here…”

“Oh, I will bring her here,” said the frog. “I rather enjoy that sort of thing.”

And without so much as a thank you, Sigrun turned and ran, eager to see her new house. The frog sighed, blinked his lavender froggy eyes, and—poof!—a confused and frightened Hulda was standing next to him.

“Don’t be afraid, gentle lady,” said the frog. “I have brought you here to grant you a wish. Anything you wish for shall be yours.”

“Me? Bah! Why?” asked Hulda, her face as hard and cold as a diamond. “What sorcery is this? What do you want in return?”

“Nothing, dear lady. It is a gift,” and he bowed, “from the Blue Frog of the Blue Moon.” The frog was tiring of explaining this. Ordinarily, he had to explain only once in a Blue Moon.

Hulda paced, deep in thought. It was not long before she said in a voice as sour as a barrel of pickled lemons, “I am ready.”

“So quickly?” sighed the frog. But this time he did not argue.

“You are to turn my worst enemy into an ugly boulder four feet high. She is to live forever within that stone, right in the middle of the village square.”

The frog looked amused, in a froggy sort of way. “Are you quite sure this is what you want? Not huge riches? Or—why, I don’t know, dear lady—magical powers, or a pleasant personality?”

“This is better than riches or powers. Her rage will be sweet enough to make up for a hundred wishes. But…”

“Yes?”

“But how will you know my worst enemy?”

“My good woman—my dear Hulda,” the frog said, his pale blue pouchy chin jiggling with laughter. “I am a magic blue frog. I plucked you from your silly little cottage and brought you here. I can grant any wish. Don’t you think I know such a simple thing as that?”

“I suppose so.” Hulda was quiet for a moment. “I want you to wait twenty minutes before granting this wish. So I can be there when it happens.”

“As you like,” said the frog, pulling a rainbow-colored pocket watch from his brocade vest. “Twenty minutes it shall be.” And he shook his head, chortling so, that a single froggy tear shimmied its way from his iridescent eye to his wobbly jowls.

Without so much as a thank you, Hulda turned and ran, eager to get back to the village to witness Sigrun’s bad fortune.

*     *     *

“This is my new home. Is it not the most beautiful home you have ever seen? Is it not far larger and more beautiful than yours?”

As Hulda neared the village square, the hubbub and clamor of an excited crowd reached her puzzled ears. One by one, the village folk had been coming to the square as word of the magnificent new house had spread from mouth to ear, from mouth to ear, all across the land. The whole village was there, oohing and aahing, and Sigrun was in her glory.

Her tone as sharp as the sharpest spindle, her back as straight as the straightest tree, Sigrun said, to anyone who would listen, “This is my new home. Is it not the most beautiful home you have ever seen? Is it not far larger and more beautiful than yours?”

Perched on top of a nearby fountain, the blue frog sat, his pocket watch in his longer-than-long froggy fingers.

Hulda pushed her way through the crowd. “What is this?” she asked, thinking perhaps the frog had played a cruel trick.

A small boy had just begun, “It is Sigrun’s new house,” when—poof!—Sigrun flew high into the sky where she vanished with a pop! Not half a second later, a large boulder appeared in the center of the square, crushing the house. The screams and shouts from the crowd died down as a cackling Hulda shouldered her way through the throng, walked to the boulder, and patted its side.

“How are you, dear Sigrun?” Hulda could not hide her glee. “Enjoying your new house?”

The village folk were amazed and frightened to hear a tiny, angry voice come from within the boulder. Hulda, her ear pressed against the rock, smiled a poisonous smile. At the fountain, the frog whispered, “And now, Sigrun, your third wish. I shall turn your worst enemy into an ugly boulder not four, but twelve feet high, right in the middle of the square.”

And before the people’s very eyes—poof!— Hulda flew up high into the sky where she vanished with a pop! Another boulder appeared, three times uglier and three times bigger than the first, and balanced right on top of it. With that, the people fled, each fearful of being next to poof! and pop!

*     *     *

The braver folk returned that night and under the light of the Blue Moon they built a brick wall, far taller than the tallest villager, around the entire square. They left one small opening in the wall and into this they set stout iron bars, leaving spaces far smaller than the head of the smallest child in the village. And while many people over the years have peered in and listened, no one has ever set foot in the square again.

It is said that to this day, if you put your ear to the opening and you are very, very quiet, you will hear two small, bitter voices bickering and arguing, arguing and bickering. And if you are very, very lucky, they say you can sometimes see a dashing blue frog, dressed in the finest of finery, with a saffron silk top hat and shimmering topaz cane, dancing on top of the boulders in the moonlight. But only sometimes. Only once in a Blue Moon.

This is Lydia’s first piece for young people. She holds a Master’s in astrophysics, but now writes for a living—contract writing by necessity and creative writing by night. Her short fiction and narrative nonfiction have been published online and in print, read on KRCB public radio, printed on a coffee mug, and used as inspiration for a professional dance company.