Are you girlfriend boyfriend now?

No.

The answer to that question was definitely no. And it was one she got to ponder, long after No left for Portland that morning. Lilli only had a half shift today, one she’d taken merely because one of her kids was going into surgery to have a tumor removed, and she’d promised to be there for him and his parents.

Thank goodness she’d made that promise. Because it was the only thing that got her out of bed after a morning spent in a deep, depressive sleep.

That and the sound of raised voices nearby…

Lilli followed the squabbling voices to the neighboring room, and her heart stuttered at the scene she found.

Ruby and Mrs. Santos were having a tugging war with one of No’s hoodies. And on No’s bed behind them sat an open suitcase filled with his neatly folded clothes.

“What you doing?” Ruby was yelling at the older woman. “Nakamura-sensei not moving. Why you think that?”

Oh God, Lilli thought, realizing what was going on here, even if Ruby didn’t.

“Ruby, mami, I’m only doing my job. What he told me to do.”

“He not say that. You stupid! Stupid bitch!”

Mrs. Santos gasped, and Lilli yelled out, “Ruby!”

Only to have the girl turn on her, too.

“Why he moving?” Ruby demanded. “What you do to him? Why he leaving?”

Seriously? Seriously?! She thought at the man who wasn’t in the room, or even the house, anymore. He just decided to have Mrs. Santos move him out of here? He couldn’t have even left a note for the little girl who considered him a valued mentor?

But it wasn’t as if she hadn’t grown used to dealing with the messes men left behind. Her mother. Her brother. And now, Ruby.

“Mrs. Santos,” she said quietly. “I’m sorry for my niece’s behavior. Can you give us a minute?”

“Si, of course,” Mrs. Santos agreed. “Sorry, sorry, I was trying to finish moving Mr. Nakamura’s things before Miss Ruby’s school day was done, but she came home early.”

Yes, today had been a minimum day at school, Lilli suddenly remembered. With all the baby drama, she’d totally forgotten about the schedule change. “It’s all right,” she told Mrs. Santos. “And thanks for trying.”

She waited until the door closed behind the chagrined housekeeper before cupping her niece’s shoulders. “Listen I’m sorry about this, honey, but—”

“When he be back?” Ruby demanded. “He say he take me with him to Portland tomorrow, so he coming back tonight, right?”

“Um…I don’t know,” she answered, deciding the truth was her only option. “But probably not. We got some…news today. And it looks like Nakamura-sensei will be moving back to Portland…for, um, good.”

Ruby shook her head and tears suddenly sprung to her eyes. “Iie! Iie! He promise!”

“Sweetie, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I know you were looking forward to meeting with those engineers and getting a private gymnastics coach. But sometimes people make promises, and they don’t think about how it will feel to others if they don’t keep them. Remember how your dad sometimes had trouble with that?”

Ruby’s eyes flashed, the memory of all her father’s broken promises crashing down over them like a bad Lifetime movie you’ve already watched one too many times and never want to see again. Until you go to find something on TV, and—surprise, surprise—there it is.

“I’m sorry, Ruby,” Lilli said, trying to patch up the hurt inside her niece as best she could with words. Trying to be a good nurse to this kid, even though her heart was breaking, too. “I know you’re disappointed, but we have enough money now. We’ll figure this out. We’ll find the right leg for you. Maybe interview coaches together—”

“No! I want Nakamura-sensei help me,” Ruby screamed, twisting away from her hands. “He come from samurais and you just…”

Lilli braced herself for the acid name-calling. But then Ruby’s face crumbled. “Not him,” she said mournfully, as close to crying as you could get without actual tears.

Ruby sniffed then, choosing anger over tears. “You do something bad to make him go away. You not good girlfriend. You not do him right!”

Lilli tilted her head at Ruby, not because of the insult, but because…

“Ruby, it’s not my fault he left,” she answered, her voice hard, but for once not out of anger or defensiveness. In that moment, seeing her niece cry over a dude who couldn’t be bothered to text her he was leaving, something she’d not been able to easily understand before became 100% clear.

“Sometimes people leave, Ruby. Sometimes people hurt us. Because sometimes people are assholes. And that’s not on us, that’s on them.”

“Iie,” Ruby screeched again. “Everything your fault! If you there, Papa never start with drugs again. He never do it. And I still have my leg. You ruin everything, you stupid bitch!”

Oh God. It wasn’t just the shattering of their lovely peace that brought tears to Lilli’s eyes. But her niece’s words, so reminiscent of her mother’s.

But this time, Lilli didn’t shrink away or just sit there and take it like she had before all those years with her mother.

This time Lilli drew herself up and answered both her niece and her dead mother. “I don’t. I don’t ruin everything. I’m doing my best, Ruby. I’ve always done my best. And if my best isn’t good enough for you, then that’s on you to figure out. I don’t care what you’ve been through. I’m not your punching bag. So don’t talk to me like that, do you understand?”

“Or what?” Ruby sneered. “You slap me again?”

“No, I’m not going to slap you,” Lilli answered. “But until you learn how to talk to me civilly I am taking away every privilege you have. And guess what, you entitled little bitch, you won’t get anything else from me until you learn how to ask nicely for what you want, instead of demanding it. Meanwhile I will continue to hope to God you grow up and finally realize we’re family, Ruby. The only family either of us has left. Because Mr. Nakamura isn’t worth this. No man, who’d just up and leave is worth it. That’s what I’m going to do instead of slapping the hell out of you like my mom would have done.

“From now on I’m going to choose who to spend my time with. And right now I’m choosing a kid who’s going to get a cancerous tumor removed today, but has somehow figured out how not to blame me whenever he’s angry about the hand life has dealt them. So before I go get ready for work, let me suggest something to you, Ruby. Get over yourself!”

Eyes blazing with long tamped down anger, she pointed at Ruby, not caring that it was one of the rudest things you could do to someone of Japanese descent. “And little girl, don’t you come at me again until you have.”

With that, Lilli walked out of the room. For once leaving her niece behind, rather than the other way around.

Yeah, her empathy switch was turned all the way off now. Empathy and understanding would only get you so far with some people, she decided as she took her shower and dried of. No had definitely taught her that. And Ruby was about to learn the hard way, just how unsympathetic her aunt could get….

Which was why Lilli was so surprised to find her niece sitting on top of her bed when she stepped back into her bedroom.

Lilli paused, bracing herself for what Ruby would say next.

But then her niece sniffed and whispered, “He promise to teach me, and he come from samurai. I thought he was different from Papa. I thought he keep promises. Nobody but you keep promises...”

And that was when Ruby began to cry inconsolably.

And just like that, the empathy switch Lilli’d managed to turn off for almost an entire hour flipped right back on.

God, why was life so hard sometimes? she wondered as she sat down on the bed and pulled her sobbing niece into her arms. Why did some people get life handed to them on a platter, while others just keep losing people and body parts until it felt like they had nothing left to give?

But then Ruby shocked the shit out of her by suddenly surging sideways and wrapping her thin arms around Lilli’s neck. Actually hugging her back as she said, “It’s okay, Aunt Ana. We’ll be okay without him.”

“Yeah,” Lilli agreed after she got over her initial shock of receiving a hug from her niece. “We totally will be.”

“Because we’re family,” Ruby finished, her voice cracking. “And you know what? I’m not like them. I’m not. I’m going to keep promises I make, even if he doesn’t. That’s what I’m going to do from now on. Okay?”

“Okay,” Lilli agreed, although she wasn’t one-hundred percent clear what she was saying okay to.

In any case, they ended up riding into Seattle together, holding hands in the back seat of Dallas’s Escalade as they stared out their separate windows.

But just as they pulled off the 520, Dallas asked, “So what’s the deal here, Rubes, you got appointments at the hospital today?”

“No, I just hanging out. I do my extra English homework while Aunt Ana help really sick kid.”

“Yeah, as fun as that sounds, you want to have dinner with me and Uta instead?” he asked. “We’re going to be talking a whole lot of English together since I don’t know no German. And showing how good I am with kids will probably be a good look for me.”

The only thing more surprising than Dallas’s offer was Ruby’s hesitation to accept it. “I promise Aunt Ana I go with her,” she answered.

“It’s totally fine if you don’t,” Lilli assured her. “I totally release you from your promise. Plus, it sounds like Dallas really needs your help. Don’t know if you’ve noticed, but his English isn’t so great either.”

“Hey!” Dallas said as Ruby snickered. “Why people always got stuff to say about my Jersey accent?”

Lilli was still laughing by the time she entered the hospital. By herself, but for the first time since returning to the States, she had real hope with regards to her and Ruby’s future relationship. Which weirdly was thanks, in part, to the man who’d dropped out of their life without a word of warning.

“Hey!” she greeted Anitra happily when she saw her new friend, standing outside the nurse’s station, already going over the tumor kid’s chart.

Anitra wasn’t a surgeon, but like Lilli she seemed to value “being there” for her patients, even if she wasn’t technically the one who’d be doing the cutting today.

“How’s he doing?” Lilli asked, coming to stand beside her. “Are we going to have to talk to his parents again?”

Yesterday she and the doctor had to sit the patient’s parents down to explain that though their fear was understandable, hugging their son and telling him how very much they loved him every other minute was only going to freak him out right before his major surgery.

“Good…and the parents have definitely calmed down,” Anitra answered. “But what are you doing here?”

Lilli slid her a quizzical look. “I told you yesterday I’d be taking a half-shift today so I could be here for Khalil, remember?”

“Yeah, you did,” Anitra answered, setting down the chart. “But then Harriet Fields announced this morning you’d resigned your position.”

“Wait, what?!?!” Lilli started to ask, only to get interrupted when her watch went off.

It was a message from Mrs. Santos: Sorry about earlier, but wanted you to know I finished moving Mr. Nakamura’s things into your room.