He nodded, eyes wounded. The distance stayed.
***
Saturday morning, I took Noah to the cemetery. I brought white daisies. Noah carried them with both hands like a serious job.
“Mom… Ethan isn’t there.”
Ethan’s headstone still looked too new. I knelt and brushed off leaves.
“Hi, baby,” I whispered.
Noah didn’t come closer.
“Come here,” I said. “Let’s say hi to your brother.”
Noah stared at the stone, then went stiff.
“Sweetheart?” I asked.
“He told me.”
He swallowed. “Mom… Ethan isn’t there.”
“What do you mean he isn’t there?”
Noah pointed past the stone. “He’s not in there.”
I stood slowly. “Ethan is here.”
Noah flinched.
I lowered my voice. “Sometimes people say someone isn’t there because we can’t see them.”
“Ethan came back.”
“No,” he whispered. “He told me. He said he’s not there.”
“Who told you?”
Noah’s eyes widened. “Ethan.”
My hands went cold.
“Okay,” I said too quickly. “Let’s go get hot chocolate.”
Noah nodded fast, relieved.
“It’s a secret.”
***
On Monday, he climbed into the car and said it again. “Ethan came back.”
I paused with the seatbelt halfway across his chest.
“At school?”
He nodded. “By the fence. He talked to me. He said stuff.”
“What stuff?”
Noah’s eyes slid away. “It’s a secret.”
“I’m calling the school.”
My heart kicked hard. “Noah, we don’t keep secrets from Mommy.”
“He told me not to tell you,” Noah whispered.
I gripped the seatbelt. “Listen. If any person tells you to keep a secret from me, you tell me anyway. Okay?”
Noah hesitated, then nodded.
