The Goodbye Time by Celeste Conway

you won’t be with me; you’re going away just like Sam, and you won’t be living in our house, so how can you say I’m never getting rid of you? No one’s making any sense!”
    “Anna, come on. It’s different with Katy’s brother. He can’t write to her or call her on the telephone. He can’t send her an e-mail every day.”
    “You’ll send me an e-mail every day?”
    “Well, maybe not every single day. But you’ll hear from me a lot. You’ll probably get sick of hearing from me. And I’ll be home on holidays and plenty of weekends too.” He reached to the counter and grabbed a paper napkin. “Here, you lunatic, blow your nose.”
    I took the napkin. “It won’t be the same.”
    “Of course not. Nothing ever stays the same. Imagine how boring it would be if it did.”
    “But why does it have to change right now—and everything all at once?”
    “I don’t know. I guess it’s just the changing time. But what’s not gonna change—I mean, way down deep—is us, our family. You and me and Mom and Dad. We’re stuck forever with Krazy Glue.”
    “I hope you’re right. That’s what I thought about Katy and me.”
    “You and Katy will be just fine. It’s like I said, you have to give her a little time.” He messed up my hair to annoy me, I guess, and get my mind away from stuff. “Want a sandwich? I’ll fix you one.”
    “I’m going to Kendra’s house for crepes.”
    “Who are you gonna go with if Katy isn’t coming by?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “Want me to take you?”
    “You serious?” He never took me anywhere.
    “Yeah, of course. Just let me eat a sandwich. Go get ready—like comb your hair.” He smiled at me and opened the bin of cold cuts, pulling out some ham.

Chapter Eleven
    When Tom’s away at Harvard, I thought, I’ll probably think of this day a lot. How nice it was walking together along Central Park. How warm and soft the air was. And how good he looked, the new green trees behind him, the blue sky shining through the patches between the leaves. I’ll think of the way we goofed around, hopping on and off the benches. How we started singing this stupid song—“The ants go marching one by one, the little one stops to suck his thumb”—over and over a million times.
    Kendra’s apartment is in this big old building at West End Avenue and Ninety-first Street. In the lobby we met Yolanda and Tyesha, who were on their way up. Tom said goodbye and told me to have a great time, and I stood there watching him until he was out the door and around the corner of the building.
    “He’s really cute,” Yolanda said as we rode in the elevator to the top floor.
    “He’s smart too,” I bragged. “He’s going to Harvard in the fall.”
    “Wow,” said Tyesha. They were both impressed. Even people who don’t know anything about colleges have heard of Harvard University.
    When we got to Kendra’s apartment the door was open and we could hear kids’ voices echoing through the rooms. We went into the huge foyer and then followed the sounds to an even huger living room, where everyone was hanging around. Kendra’s mom came over and greeted us, then called out to Kendra, “More guests,
ma chérie
!” That last part is French, in case you don’t know. Kendra broke away from a group of kids she was talking to and came to say hello.
    “Where’s Katy?” she said, looking behind me as if I was hiding Katy.
    “She couldn’t come,” I said.
    “Too bad,” she said, but it didn’t sound like she cared too much. She lowered her voice a little bit. “Michael’s here. He was, like, the second person to arrive. Anyway, come on in. Have something to drink. My aunt’s just about to serve the first batch of crepes.”
    I went in and said hi to everybody. The girls were all standing together in one group and the boys were in another group over by the table where the sodas were. It’s always like that at parties until someone breaks the ice. Usually it’s Katy who gets things