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Show 9-2 my face as I lay in bed. My skin grew hot and in the heat, suddenly, as if for the first time, I saw Andrew's face. His eyes, pulled down at the corners, looked out at me from under lash-less lids. The red skin pulled taut across the shortened nose and drooping across his cheeks seemed to glow with painful heat. I pulled the sheet up over my face and clenched my eyes against the night. The sheets rubbed against my face and I saw his hands, muffled in bandages, trying to shield his face from the sun. I sat straight up in bed. Ruth was reading her paper in the front room, her feet propped on a stool in front of her. She folded her paper carefully when I came in. "Ruth, I need to go to the hospital today. St. John's." "To see your father?" "No." I took a deep breath. "To see a friend." She folded her hands behind her head* "You have a friend at St. John's? I didn't know that." "I haven't known him for very long. Just a few days." "Oh? Tell me about him." "Well, I met him a few days ago. He's really nice. And he likes to look at my books and talk to me." "Why is he there?" "What?" "Annie, St. John's is a hospital. For the sick and wounded. Why is he there? What's wrong with him?" I thought of all the things my father had said were wrong with Andrew. "He was, umh, hurt. He was in France." |