It takes courage to face a world gone dark
THE WINDOW
Chapter 1
"STAY SEATED, Mandy," the flight attendant says. "When the other passengers have gotten off, I'll come get you."
Right. She should try staying seated herself, when everybody else is standing up and the guy by the window wants out and stuff's tumbling from the overhead bins and you get bumped half into the aisle.
A man says, "Watch it," and some other man says, "Hey." Suddenly there's a pocket of hot silence. Everyone around has just realized I can't see.
"Those must be your folks. They've got a sign with MANDY on it."
Then a woman is hugging me, Aunt Emma I guess. Her front is soft and she's shorter than me. She laughs, flustered. "I knew you were fifteen, but somehow I hadn't pictured . . . I mean, I thought of you younger . . . "
A man hugs me, and another, hugs of wool jackets and aftershave, clumsy big hugs, and their voices rumble.
One tells me he's my uncle Gabriel. Great-uncle Gabriel. They're all greats, for that matter, Great-uncles Abe and Gabriel and Great -aunt Emma, who is Gabriel's wife.
"So, Mandy," he says, "I hope you're going to liven up our gloomy old house."
"Gabriel, hush," Aunt Emma whispers. "It's too soon."
"Don't worry about me," I say. "It's OK."
And even if it's not, I can take care of myself.
That's my gift. Other girls get blond hair and nice families and brains that tell them the right things to say. I've got knowing how to take care of myself, and how to face what I have to face.
Like that night I woke up in the hospital and heard the nurses talking about whether they should take me to my mom . . .
THE WINDOW by Jeanette Ingold
A novel for teen readers · Contemporary fiction at its best