Sybil at Sixteen by Susan Beth Pfeffer Page B

sensation of not knowing how bad the future is going to be. Seeing someone you love in pain, and feeling so helpless to do something.”
    â€œYou help me,” Sybil said. “You help me more than anybody. There are days when I wake up and I know what’s ahead and I dread it, and then I think of you, and I know I can manage. I do it for you, not to let you down, and that helps me do it for me.”
    â€œI love you, Sybil,” Nick said. “And things will get better.”
    â€œI know,” Sybil replied. “Just the walking helps strengthen my legs. And I’ll learn to manage the pain better with time. I’m sure of it.”
    â€œI’m sure of it, too,” Nick said. “We’re great at pain management, you and I.”
    â€œI wonder how Evvie is at it,” Sybil said. “Thea was right in a way. Evvie hasn’t had much experience with really bad times.”
    â€œYou mentioned something about a reward,” Nick said.
    â€œThe bank Linda Steinmetz blew up offered one,” Sybil said. “Twenty-five thousand dollars for her capture.”
    â€œThat’s a lot of money,” Nick said. “That kind of reward could only make things worse for Sam, if the wrong people found out he was with his mother.”
    Sybil kept walking, but she glanced at her father. “What kind of wrong people?” she asked.
    â€œThe kind who don’t care who gets hurt,” Nick replied. “Let’s look at this situation objectively. As of the moment, Sam’s all right. We don’t even know if he’s seen his mother yet. And even if he has, he’s still mobile. But if he does donate a kidney, then he’s going to be in the same hospital as his mother, recuperating from his surgery while she recuperates from hers, and if the wrong kinds of people find out—some clever police officer, or an orderly who makes the connection—then Sam couldn’t possibly escape whatever the consequences might be.”
    â€œYesterday Evvie said she wished Sam’s mother would get arrested before all that happened,” Sybil said. “She said she wished she’d die.”
    â€œEvvie wants to protect Sam, just as Sam wants to protect his mother,” Nick declared. “Just as I want to protect Evvie, and Sam, too, for that matter.”
    â€œBut how can you?” Sybil asked. “We don’t even know where Sam is.”
    â€œThere must be a way of finding out,” Nick said. “Of course it would have to be done immediately. And we can’t tell Evvie. She could never feel she participated in any way, even if it is what she wants. She has to be blameless in her own eyes as well as Sam’s.”
    â€œShe might get angry,” Sybil said.
    â€œI don’t think so,” Nick replied. “Not if we can keep Sam out of it. I think she’d be grateful.”
    â€œWouldn’t Sam be angry, though?” Sybil asked.
    â€œRemember how angry you’d get at me?” Nick said. “When I’d make you do your physical therapy. When I pulled you out of one rehab place and put you in another. When I forced you to walk again, because I wouldn’t accept a life for you in a wheelchair.”
    â€œThere were times I hated you,” Sybil said.
    â€œI knew you did,” Nick said. “And it killed me that you did, but it didn’t matter. It was worth it. I don’t care what Sam thinks of me for the rest of my life if I can protect him from a mistake that could prove disastrous to him. Disastrous to Evvie, for that matter.”
    â€œMegs would agree,” Sybil said. “It’s better to stop things now, before they get out of hand.”
    â€œYou saw her at breakfast,” Nick said. “She’d turn Linda Steinmetz in herself if she could.”
    â€œMaybe we should discuss this with her,” Sybil said. “She might have some good ideas about how to find