Desperately Lonely Swing Set Needs Loving Home

One swing set, wel worn but structural y sound, seeks new home. Make memories with your kid or kids so that someday he or she or they wil look

into the backyard and feel the ache of sentimentality as desperately as I did this afternoon. It’s al fragile and fleeting, dear reader, but with this swing set, your child(ren) wil be introduced to the ups and downs of human life gently and safely, and may also learn the most important lesson of al: No

matter how hard you kick, no matter how high you get, you can’t go al the way around.

Swing set currently resides near 83rd and Spring Mil.

After that, we turned on the TV for a little while, but we couldn’t find anything to watch, so I grabbed An Imperial Affliction off the bedside table and brought it back into the living room and Augustus Waters read to me while Mom, making lunch, listened in.

“‘Mother’s glass eye turned inward,’” Augustus began. As he read, I fel in love the way you fal asleep: slowly, and then al at once.

When I checked my email an hour later, I learned that we had plenty of swing-set suitors to choose from. In the end, we picked a guy named Daniel

Alvarez who’d included a picture of his three kids playing video games with the subject line I just want them to go outside. I emailed him back and told him to pick it up at his leisure.

Augustus asked if I wanted to go with him to Support Group, but I was real y tired from my busy day of Having Cancer, so I passed. We were sitting

there on the couch together, and he pushed himself up to go but then fel back down onto the couch and sneaked a kiss onto my cheek.

“Augustus!” I said.

“Friendly,” he said. He pushed himself up again and real y stood this time, then took two steps over to my mom and said, “Always a pleasure to see

you,” and my mom opened her arms to hug him, whereupon Augustus leaned in and kissed my mom on the cheek. He turned back to me. “See?” he

asked.

I went to bed right after dinner, the BiPAP drowning out the world beyond my room.

I never saw the swing set again.

* * *

I slept for a long time, ten hours, possibly because of the slow recovery and possibly because sleep fights cancer and possibly because I was a teenager

with no particular wake-up time. I wasn’t strong enough yet to go back to classes at MCC. When I final y felt like getting up, I removed the BiPAP snout

from my nose, put my oxygen nubbins in, turned them on, and then grabbed my laptop from beneath my bed, where I’d stashed it the night before.

I had an email from Lidewij Vliegenthart.

Dear Hazel,

I have received word via the Genies that you wil be visiting us with Augustus Waters and your mother beginning on 4th of May. Only a week away!

Peter and I are delighted and cannot wait to make your acquaintance. Your hotel, the Filosoof, is just one street away from Peter’s home. Perhaps

we should give you one day for the jet lag, yes? So if convenient, we wil meet you at Peter’s home on the morning of 5th May at perhaps ten o’clock

for a cup of coffee and for him to answer questions you have about his book. And then perhaps afterward we can tour a museum or the Anne Frank

House?

With al best wishes,

Lidewij Vliegenthart

Executive Assistant to Mr. Peter Van Houten, author of An Imperial Affliction

* * *

“Mom,” I said. She didn’t answer. “MOM!” I shouted. Nothing. Again, louder, “MOM!”

She ran in wearing a threadbare pink towel under her armpits, dripping, vaguely panicked. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. Sorry, I didn’t know you were in the shower,” I said.

“Bath,” she said. “I was just...” She closed her eyes. “Just trying to take a bath for five seconds. Sorry. What’s going on?”

“Can you cal the Genies and tel them the trip is off? I just got an email from Peter Van Houten’s assistant. She thinks we’re coming.”

She pursed her lips and squinted past me.

“What?” I asked.

“I’m not supposed to tel you until your father gets home.”

“What?” I asked again.

“Trip’s on,” she said final y. “Dr. Maria cal ed us last night and made a convincing case that you need to live your—”

“MOM, I LOVE YOU SO MUCH!” I shouted, and she came to the bed and let me hug her.

I texted Augustus because I knew he was in school:

Stil free May three?:-)

He texted back immediately.

Everything’s coming up Waters.

If I could just stay alive for a week, I’d know the unwritten secrets of Anna’s mom and the Dutch Tulip Guy. I looked down my blouse at my chest.

“Keep your shit together,” I whispered to my lungs.

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