The Other Half

TW: Illness and death of a child

Adults think that kids don’t know anything, but I know more than they think I do. I know that two plus two is four, I know that you have to behave nicely or Santa won’t give you any presents for Christmas, and I know that my friend Maya comes over every Tuesday after school to play with me at my house. Which means I know that something is wrong, because Maya didn’t come to my house last Tuesday, and she didn’t come this Tuesday either. I asked my mom where Maya was, but all she said was “she’s busy today.” I know that sometimes people are busy, and when they’re busy it means that they can’t always play with you. But Maya has never been this busy before.

Maya is so busy that she hasn’t been at school all week. Her cubby is still filled with all of her things, and her name tag is still taped onto her desk, but she hasn’t shown up for class. The teacher just acts like everything is normal, because teachers think kids don’t know anything either, but I know when something is different.

During reading time, I quietly asked the teacher: “Where’s Maya?”

“Maya’s not here today.” She replied, as if that answered my question.

“But where is she?” I asked again.

“She’s away right now,” She says.

“Where?”

“Away.” She repeats, like that explains it better the second time.

I stopped asking after that.

I start making up versions of what “away” could mean. Maybe Maya was on vacation, and she was going to come back and tell me all about the cool things that she saw. Maybe she moved houses and didn’t tell me yet. Maybe she is mad at me, and this is how people get un-mad, by disappearing for a while. I wasn’t sure. So I kept doing what Maya and I always do, while I waited for her.

I saved half of my snack.

I left a space next to me at lunch.

I didn’t let anyone sit next to me on the bus.

At home, I kept asking Mom in different ways.

“Did Maya tell you when she’s coming back?”

“Do you know where she is?”

“Is she okay?”

Mom always answered the same way: “I think she’s resting right now.”

Resting sounds like something you do when you’re tired, so I started imagining her asleep somewhere far away, like a really long nap she forgot to wake up from.

A week becomes two weeks.

Then more.

Her name stopped coming up in conversations, and I could feel the adults get nervous when I mentioned her. They seemed to step around the topic of Maya very carefully, like a wet floor they’re afraid to slip on.

Once, I heard Mom talking on the phone in the hallway, her voice was low.

“I just don’t know what to tell him.” She whispered. “He keeps asking about her. Do I tell him she’s sick?”

I knew that she was talking about me, and about Maya. I wondered what Maya was sick with. One time, when I was four, I got so sick I had to go to the hospital to get better. I wondered if Maya was in the hospital too. When I was in the hospital, my family brought me lots of toys so I wouldn’t be sad and would have something to play with. I ran upstairs to my room to pick out the perfect toy for Maya. She liked dinosaurs, like me, so we always played with them together. Her favorite dinosaur was the T-Rex, so I knew that was the perfect toy to bring her. I ran back downstairs to tell my mom, and I heard her whispers on the phone again.

“He’s noticed she’s not at school and he keeps asking his teacher, it’s not their place to handle this situation. I have to figure out something,” She sighed, “But how am I supposed to explain this to a kid his age? I mean it’s c–”

“Mommy?” I asked, tugging on her sleeve, she jumped slightly, startled by my presence. “Mommy can I bring this toy to Maya? The T-Rex is her favorite and she hasn’t been here to play with him.”

“I’m sorry sweetie, we can’t go see Maya right now,” She said, holding my face gently.

“Can we send it to her in the mail?” I asked.

She hesitated before answering: “Yes, honey, we can do that.”

One day after school, I went over to Maya’s house. I rang the doorbell, hoping she could come outside to play, but nobody answered. I rang it again. I’m not sure how long I waited by her porch, but it felt like a bajillion years. Nobody ever came. I don’t know how long I stood there before I left.

At school, her seat stayed empty long enough that it stopped looking wrong to other people, but not to me. I still looked at it sometimes when I was supposed to be doing math. Sometimes I thought I saw her there anyway, like my brain forgets what’s real. Every morning when I’d walk in, I kept thinking she would come in after me, but she never did.

One day, I heard two parents talking in the hallway when they thought no one was listening. I didn’t understand everything, but I could hear them.

“Her parents are taking it hard,” One said.

“Especially so young,” The other replied, “it’s just tragic.”

“She fought for a long time.” The first one said, quieter than before.

I didn’t go in the hallway after that. I went back to my seat and looked at Maya’s chair, empty. I wondered who she was fighting. I would have fought with her too if I had known. My mom says you’re not supposed to fight people, but if Maya needed my help, I would have fought a T-Rex.

At home that night, I asked Mom again.

“Is Maya coming back?”

She waited a long time before answering. She sat next to me instead, like the answer needed her whole body, not just her words.

“No, sweetie,” She said.

I waited for more.

It didn’t come.

“Did she move?” I asked.

Mom shook her head, then she said something different this time.

“She didn’t get better.”

I didn’t understand what she meant, but she didn't say more. She tucked me into bed, kissed me goodnight, and left.

When I woke up, I spent some time sitting on my floor. I thought about all the empty spaces Maya left behind; her seat, her shoes at the door, her voice that used to fill the house without trying. I tried to imagine where she is now, but my brain wouldn’t build it properly anymore. I don’t know where she went, I just know she’s not here, and she’s not better. I tried to think of where she went, but it’s like a pen that ran out of ink; just scratches on a white paper, with nothing to say.

When I go to school that day, I don’t save half my snack.

I eat it all.

But I still leave a space next to me at lunch, just in case.