The Care and Handling of Roses With Thorns by Margaret Dilloway

and I can’t close it. Riley? My niece, Riley? A thousand jumbled thoughts go through my head. My voice is calm and emotionless when I speak, though.
    “Where’s your mother?”
    “New York, right now. She’s on a business trip. Then they’re sending her to Hong Kong for a couple of months.” Riley meets my eyes and I expect to see fear, or sadness. Her expression is blank. I imagine she’s telling herself that everything is all right, that she is in her happy place. Or perhaps she has simply taught herself to be numb to the aftereffects of her tornado of a mother, like I have for my sister. Anger at her mother blooms anew. How dare she? What was Becky thinking? She wasn’t, is the answer. There is no point in asking.
    “She took the bus here.” Dr. O’Malley runs his hand through his hair. This time I actually see three hairs fall out and feel sorry for him. “From San Francisco.”
    “That’s not too far,” I say. This must be a dream. I touch Riley’s shoulder and the bony knob feels real. I note the fact that my niece is resourceful under pressure. Good for her.
    The headmaster looks at me funny. What I said was odd, I realize. Am I trying to pretend that it’s normal for a mother to send her only child across the state alone, without telling the person expecting her?
    “I’ll call her mother immediately.” My voice sounds distant. I wonder if I am in shock, or if it’s this sinus infection fog.
    I walk around the front of the chair so I can face her. Even when she’s seated and I’m standing, she’s not that much shorter than I am. The last time I saw her, she was a little girl. Now she’s nearly unrecognizable. She used to have dark blond hair that looked exactly like Becky’s, and dressed in the ladylike clothes Becky bought for her. Every trace of that innocent has been stamped away.
    If I had had a daughter, if Riley had been mine, she would be different. She would not be wearing black clothes and she certainly wouldn’t be thousands of miles away from me.
    I realize I can’t remember Riley’s birthday without my calendar. It shames me.
    “Riley?” I whisper, unnecessarily.
    “Yeah?” She angles her face away from mine.
    “It’s good to see you.” I mean it. I think about hugging her and bend over awkwardly, but she twists away, her head back.
    Her eyes, purposefully blank, the same hazel as my sister’s, darken into a yellowish green as she lifts her head. “Mom said you knew.”
    “Knew what?” I am racking my brain.
    “She talked to Grandma and set it up.” Riley clutches the gray-on-gray Hello Kitty tote bag on her lap.
    My parents are in France for the next two weeks. I remember the conversation I had with my mother after my procedure. She had said something about Riley leaving her mom—to stay with her, not me. After their trip to France. Not right now.
    Had I agreed to something I didn’t remember? I might have been medicated when I spoke with my mother, but she’d never have suggested this. Not with my illness.
    “Mom said you said I could come here. Free tuition.” She breathes in deeply. Under her overcoat, I see she is painfully thin. Her pale fingers tremble. “I guess Mom got it wrong, huh?”
    Free tuition. Yes, there was free tuition for faculty offspring. Or legal wards. Had I mentioned this to Becky, ever? If so, it was in passing. Maybe during a long-ago Christmas conversation, yes, I had said casually, “Too bad she’s not mine. She could go to St. Mark’s for free.” And this was considered an open invitation? Assuming things, as she always did. Taking what she could.
    I put my hand on Riley’s wrist. God, it’s so small I could snap it like a piece of chalk. She’s more fragile than I am. What has my sister done to her? She should be growing bone mass to guard against osteoporosis. She needs calcium and vitamin D. “We’ll figure it out. I’ll take care of it.”
    “You better go on home for the day.” Dr. O’Malley stands. “Gal, do