Page 73 of Feral King

“That’s the foundation Lyra issaving,” he corrects. “She’s better at it than anyone we’ve ever had.”

My face warms, and I do my best to suppress a spreading smile.

The conversation drifts. Mama asks about New York, about the company, about whether or not Julian has ever eaten a proper po’boy—he hasn’t—and Julian answers with total patience and attentiveness, as if there’s nowhere else on earth he’d rather be than sitting here and chatting with Mama.

I listen happily. Mama asks more questions, the way she always does with new people. He tells her about living in Moscow, about how his father sent him to a boarding school in Connecticut when he was fourteen, because he wanted to get him used to America. He says he hated it at first—the rules and how the American boys mocked his accent.

But then he says he grew to love it.

She asks him about work, and he tells her about his time abroad over the past three years. Not the details, of course, but about the sights and sounds of Beijing, his apartment overlooking the Forbidden City. About his months in Shanghai, the noise and the neon, and the strange loneliness of living in a city where no one other than a few know your name.

I’m fascinated by the way he describes it—like a business trip that lasted too long.

At 3:15 a.m., Mama falls asleep with her head on my shoulder. Julian’s still awake, alert and ready for anything. He sits on my other side, my hand in his. I am trying to ignore the worry and the fear, the not knowing of what my father is going through.

“Julian… why did you come?”

He keeps his eyes forward.

“Because you needed me.”

“No. Why did you really come?”

He’s quiet for a long moment, then he takes a slow breath and speaks.

“Because I read the note and realized that you had something important to tell me but felt like you couldn’t. And that I made you feel that way.”

I shift in my seat, not sure how his words make me feel.

“I should’ve just told you. I should’ve come back and told you.”

“You shouldn’t have had to. That’s on me. Not you.”

I lean my head against his shoulder and close my eyes.

At 4:22 a.m., the double doors open.

Dr. Broussard is a tall man with kind eyes. He’s dressed in surgical scrubs, his face showing the sort of exhaustion you’d expect from someone who’s been standing over anopen chest for three hours. He pulls his mask down, and for one terrible second, I expect the worst.

Then he smiles.

“The surgery was a success. He’s in recovery. His vitals are strong.”

Mama wakes up when I sit up straighter in my seat, trying not to jump up with excitement. When she sees Dr. Broussard’s face and smile, she begins to cry. They are tears of happiness and relief; tears she’s been holding back for weeks.

I’m crying, too. Mama and I hold each other.

He’s alive. He’s going to be okay.

Julian doesn’t say a word. He gently puts his hand on my back and lets us have the moment.

When I look up at him through teary eyes, there’s a small smile on his face and an almost imperceptible glassiness in his eyes.

My parent’s house is a shotgun double on Piety Street in the Bywater—white clapboard, wraparound porch, and green shutters, with a porch swing built by my dad the summer I turned eight. The magnolia tree out front is older than the house.

Julian stands in the living room, looking at framed photos on the mantel. There’s one of me in a Mardi Gras costume as a baby, me at sixteen in a prom dress I’d saved six months for,and one of my parents on their wedding day outside St. Augustine Church, my grandmother Rose standing nearby.

“Stop analyzing the layout,” I say with a smile. “There’s the front door, the back door, and maybe a dozen windows. We’ll be fine.”