Save Me by Lisa Scottoline Page A

times. When she was little, the only bombs she saw were in cartoons, round black bowling balls with wiggly cotton strings.
    “It was a big noise.”
    “Sure was. Did it scare you?”
    “Yes. I didn’t come out of the bathroom.”
    “I know. Is that why?”
    “No. Remember Fire Safety Week?”
    “Not really.” Rose remembered nothing, and Melly remembered everything.
    “At our old school, we went to the firehouse on Fire Safety Week. You came, and we climbed on top of the firetruck, and they gave me a green sticker for my bedroom window and for Googie. It says, Save Our Dog.”
    “Okay.”
    “They said, don’t open the door if it’s hot. The bathroom door was hot, so I didn’t open it, then I couldn’t breathe. I hit the door and hollered so people would know I was inside, but nobody came to get me.”
    Rose felt a pang. “Well, it’s all right now.”
    “How did I get out?”
    “I got you out.”
    “Is that how you hurt your hand?”
    “No,” Rose lied. She’d burned it when she’d picked up the burning stud. “It got burned in the cafeteria, but it’s nothing.”
    “Remember when Quirrell gets burned by Harry’s scar? He gets burned on his hands, too.”
    “This wasn’t that bad.” Rose flashed on the mothers making fun of Melly’s love of Harry Potter, then put it out of her mind. She and Melly had read the Potter books aloud before bedtime, and it was easy to see why Melly identified with a kid with a scar on his face.
    “I’m sorry I ran to the bathroom, Mom.”
    Rose felt a twinge. Sometimes she thought motherhood was full of twinges. “It’s okay, I understand why you’d be upset. Does Amanda tease you like that a lot?”
    Melly fell silent.
    “Huh, Mel? Does she?”
    Melly didn’t answer. She wasn’t a whiner. She hadn’t complained about any of the teasing at their old school because she thought if they did anything about it, it would get worse, and she’d been right.
    “Mel, I won’t do anything, I promise. I just want to know.” Rose looked over, but she could barely make out Melly’s profile in the dark. “What does Amanda do?”
    “Yesterday we were finger-painting with Ms. Canton.”
    “Okay,” Rose said, keeping her tone drama-free. Melly, Amanda, and two other children in Mrs. Nuru’s class were in the gifted program, spending an hour in the afternoons with Kristen Canton, twice a week.
    “I was painting a picture of Dumbledore, and Amanda put poster paint on with her finger and painted on her cheek, like with the jelly. Ms. Canton told her it’s not funny or caring, and how we’re a community. I love Ms. Canton.”
    “Me, too,” Rose said, hearing Melly’s voice warm.
    “Her favorite Harry Potter is The Sorcerer’s Stone, and she has a cat named Hedwig and a Hermione wand. She says it looks just like it came from Ollivander’s. It doesn’t light up, but it sounds cool.”
    “I bet.” Rose felt lucky that Melly had found a fellow Harry Potter fanatic in the gifted teacher. “Maybe we should get some sleep, honey.”
    “I’m not tired.”
    “Okay, we’ll just rest.” Rose held her closer, feeling her body grow heavier. In the next few minutes, Melly fell quiet, her breathing grew regular, and she fell asleep.
    Rose lay awake in the dark, and found herself wishing that Melly had never had the birthmark. It wasn’t the first time she’d fantasized about how their life would be different, without. The birthmark had come to define Melly and their family, and they all revolved around the red circle as if it were the sun itself, setting them all in mad, dizzying orbit.
    Rose let her thoughts run free, knowing it was forbidden, like a family dog running through an electric fence. It was the birthmark that had started the sequence of awful events today, whether Leo would say that was a but for cause or not. Funny, Rose hadn’t even seen the birthmark when Melly was first put on her chest, as a newborn. In her first instant as a mother, Rose felt