Rachel Alexander 09 - Without a Word

not acceptable. Not for me. And not for him,” pointing to Dashiell, who was standing next to her in the doorway.
    Madison turned and looked up at me. I didn’t need to hear the question.
    “He’s my partner,” I said, letting that sit in the air between us for a moment. “He can do things I can’t.” Her face still turned toward mine, listening.
    I pointed to my nose. “You know dogs can analyze odors in a way humans can’t, right?” Was I expecting her to answer me? “Well, suppose I find Sally. How would I know her? I only have an old picture of her, from when she was a fifteen-year-old kid.” I took a step into the office and picked up the yearbook and opened it to the page where the Post-it was, the page with Sally’s picture on it. I thought Madison might react, take the book, make a sound, start to cry. But she didn’t. She looked at the picture of her mother, then back at me. “But if I had something of hers with me, like the coat I found in the back of the closet on Saturday, Dashiell would know her scent, and he could tell me if the person I thought was Sally really was.”
    I closed the book and put it back on the desk.
    “It’s a long shot, finding her.” I put my hands on Madison’s shoulders. “But that’s not a reason not to try, is it?” For a moment, we stayed like that, Madison facing me, my hands on her skinny shoulders, feeling the small bones under her skin. Then she turned and continued down the hall to my room. She put the purse with Emil/Emily in it on top of my dresser, dropped her backpack on the floor and slid into bed.
    I pulled up the covers and shut off the light. I wanted to kiss her, to sit on the bed and hug her, but I wasn’t sure it was a good idea, and I didn’t want to spoil what seemed like the beginning of trust. Then, in order to make sure she didn’t get scared, I ended up doing it anyway.
    “If you wake up and I’m not here, it means I’ll be walking Dashiell around the block and that I’ll be right back.” She still had her glasses on, but it didn’t matter. There was no way to hide what was happening. The twitching began immediately, quickly followed by that jumping in her cheeks, both this time. Her mouth opened as if she was going to say something, but she didn’t. Even in the dark, I could see that her lips were trembling.
    Not the notes over my desk, not the discussion of how Dashiell might help identify Sally, not the photo of her mother at sixteen and pregnant. What terrified her was the thought of me going out to walk the dog and disappearing off the face of the earth, the way her mother had.
    She sat up against the pillows. I sat on the bed. Dashiell jumped up and stood at the foot of the bed, then walked up and lay down across her feet.
    “Would it make you feel better if you got dressed and came with me?”
    There was no response, of course. Madison stayed where she was, under the covers, not making any attempt to get up, her face turned away from me.
    I put my hand on her leg, near where Dashiell was lying. “Eventually, you’re going to have to make up your mind to let a lot of this stuff go,” I said.
    She turned and looked at me.
    “Terrible things happen to people, all kinds of things, and some people seem to get more of them than others. You, for instance. But the awful things that happened to you, they’re not your fault. You do know that, don’t you?”
    That’s when the first tear fell.
    “So at some point,” I whispered, leaning a little closer to her, “maybe not today, maybe not until you’re fourteen, say, or even a grown-up, but at some point, you have to decide to live your life despite the bad stuff. You have to say to yourself, Madison Spector, it’s your life and you have a choice in how you want to live it, in what you want it to be. You already know you can’t control everything. But there are things you can control,” reaching out to touch her hand. Then whispering, “Despite everything, you can have a life.” She was still looking at me, not moving.
    “It’s true,” I said. “You can. You’re strong and you’re smart and you’re beautiful. You’re a fabulous kid. If you don’t believe me . . .“
    I turned and looked at Dashiell, as if he would chime in now, help me convince Madison that our higher opinion of her worth was the one she should embrace as well. She reached out and put her hand over my mouth, her fingers warm against my lips. Then she slid down under the covers, turning