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night, I went to the pub where
Angela worked and asked to speak to her. The manager informed me
that she had called in sick for the past three days.
    As soon as my shift ended, I rode my bike to
her parents’ house and knocked on the door. Her mother
answered.
    “Oh, Jesse,” she said with a look of
sympathy and regret that caught me off guard. “Hi.”
    I was still out of breath from the long bike
ride, and had to wipe my coat sleeve across my brow. “Is Angela
here?”
    “Yes, she’s in her room.” Mrs. Donovan
stepped back and opened the door wider to invite me in. “Why don’t
you go in and talk to her? She could use some cheering up.”
    “Cheering up?” I replied as I stepped over
the threshold and removed my sneakers.
    Mrs. Donovan sighed. “She hasn’t been
feeling well for the past few days. I can’t get her to eat and she
won’t go see a doctor. I’m a bit concerned.”
    “Does she have any other symptoms?” I asked.
Not that it would make a difference if Mrs. Donovan recited a list
because I wasn’t a medical professional. I loaded suitcases on
airplanes for a living.
    “Do you mean like a sinus infection or
nausea?” she asked. “Not that I know of. She just won’t get out of
bed. I’d like her to have some blood work done because it could be
an iron deficiency or something simple like that. Maybe you could
talk her into going to see her doctor? She won’t listen to me. She
keeps telling me she’s fine.”
    “I’ll try.”
    I moved down the hall and knocked on her
door. No answer came, so I knocked a second time. Meanwhile my
heart began to pound. What if this was something more serious, like
cancer or some other fatal ailment?
    If that’s what we were dealing with we
needed to find out sooner rather than later. I knocked harder and
more urgently.
    Chair legs scraped across the floor inside,
followed by the sound of rapid footsteps.
    “What is it?” Angela snapped from the other
side of the door.
    At least she’s out of bed, I thought.
    “It’s me. Jesse.”
    More silence.
    “Can I come in?” I asked.
    She certainly took her time thinking about
it. I was forced to stand in the hallway while her mother watched
me discreetly from the kitchen.
    I knew in that moment that something was
definitely wrong with my girlfriend. Then the knob slowly turned,
and the door opened.

Chapter Sixteen
     
    “Geez, you look like hell,” I said when
Angela invited me in.
    Her hair was greasy and matted to her head.
She wore a loose pair of gray sweatpants with holes at the knees
and a white T-shirt that had seen better days. There was a filmy
sheen to her complexion. If I didn’t know better, I’d think she
hadn’t washed her face since Christmas.
    “I know,” she replied and shut the door
behind me.
    I moved into the room and glanced around at
the unmade bed and the dirty dishes on the nightstand. “You
okay?”
    “Not really.” She sat down on the edge of
the bed and dropped her gaze to her hands on her lap. I wondered
why she wouldn’t look at me.
    Crouching down before her, I took both her
hands in mine. “What can I do?”
    “Nothing.”
    I paused, then raised her hands to my lips
and kissed them. “Your mom wanted me to convince you to go see a
doctor. She thinks you might have an iron deficiency.”
    I certainly wasn’t about to say, ‘You should
get tested because you might have some horrible terminal
disease.’
    Angela shook her head. “I don’t have an iron
deficiency.”
    “Then what is it?” I asked. “Tell me because
I want to help. I miss you and I want you to feel better. No matter
what it takes, I’m here for you.”
    Her eyes lifted and she regarded me with
dark and angry derision. I felt as if I’d just walked onto the set
of The Exorcist .
    More than a little shaken by this change in
the girl I loved, I sat back on the floor and leaned on both arms.
“Talk to me.”
    For a long moment she fiddled with the
frayed fabric around the holes of her sweatpants,