She shakes her head, refusing to look at me. She hasn’t looked at me all day, and it makes the shadow I woke up with loom more prominently inside of me.

After showering and pulling on some clean sweats, I go back to find Ace in her room, curled up into Zeus and crying. My heart aches as I tug on Zeus’s collar to get him to jump down and fill his spot. I trace my fingers over her spine and her cries become louder, filling me with more of my own tears. Her body is limp as I pull her closer to me. I’m pretty certain all of her fighting was expended trying to get through this day.

Eventually she falls asleep and I hold her to me. There’s something so unfamiliar between us right now, something that makes it difficult for me to relax and impossible for me to fall asleep.

Holding onto Ace begins to feel like gripping a handful of dry sand; the harder I work to comfort her and break through her walls, the more of her I lose.

The day of the funeral arrives and I feel the shadow looming with such darkness, it’s hard for me to focus on much else. I’ve been dreading this day. Everything is still so fresh and raw. I know the tiny layer of skin that has started to build over the deep wound is about to be ripped off, and I fear that the laceration may be deeper this time, especially for Ace, who still isn’t fairing well. I have yet to see her eat more than a few bites or sleep a full night.

A few days ago, she started vanishing. Completely disappearing. Always in the middle of the night when no one is there to see her go. She had asked me not to stay over anymore after the first night. I had tried not to act as hurt as I felt and nodded in response but begged her to let me help, to talk to me. She didn’t, and hasn’t.

The next night I was lying awake in my bed, mulling over Ace’s recent changes and contemplating what effects I caused and which were from David, when I received a frantic call from Kendall. It was two in the morning and Ace’s first act of disappearance, which turned into one of many. We were all freaked out, not sure of where she could have gone, as we scoured the entire house top to bottom and found her cell phone and belongings untouched. Her car was still in San Diego, so we knew she hadn’t driven anywhere.

Kendall called Caulder and Kyle, and Muriel called the police, as Jenny, Jameson, my mom, and I began frantically searching for her, calling out and waking up half of the neighborhood who joined in our efforts to find her. The police and the rest of the family arrived shortly thereafter.

It was Mindi who realized where she’d be. She was tucked away in the shop, fast asleep on the bench seat of Clementine.

“She and dad used to spend hours out here together when we were kids.” She said it like it wasn’t a big deal, but it was. I could sense it.

“Something isn’t right,” Kendall admitted softly.

Out of the corner of my eye, I caught sight of Kyle kicking over a lawn chair and turned to watch as he looked up at the sky, spewing a train of curses. I didn’t know if it was to David, a higher being, or no one at all, but he bent over and picked up the same lawn chair he’d kicked and heaved it at the ground, following after it and kicking it viciously. I’m pretty sure it was his way of admitting that he also knew that things weren’t right.

I’ve hardly seen Ace all morning and have a feeling that’s what she’s intended.

People begin arriving, sifting through the funeral home, and still, I don’t see her. Apparently even Jenny and Kendall aren’t sure where she is, and she rode here with them.

Abby, Jesse, Adam, Jameson, and I comb the unfamiliar funeral home for her and come up empty handed. Finding her at her own house has proven to be difficult. How in the hell are we going to find her here?

“I know where she is,” Kyle says, dashing out a back door before any of us are able to comment.

I turn to follow him, and Muriel approaches me, asking me to bring the casseroles and other sundry food items like bags of lettuce and rolls that have continued to be left at their house to a homeless shelter. I’m about to object and suggest they actually heat one up. I haven’t seen any of them eat anything, let alone a meal, but she wastes no time turning and bustling over to straighten a large photo of David and the girls that sits on an easel by the open casket.

It’s been five days since David passed away. He’d been at work at Saint Andrew’s Hospital, surrounded by cardiac doctors and nurses—some of the best and most prominent surgeons in the country—but it had been too late from the moment it occurred.

They found out that David, a heart specialist, had an aortic aneurysm. They tried to resuscitate him. My mom said they had tried well past the point where even if he had come back, he would never have gained brain function again. But when it’s someone you care about, someone you love, how do you give up?

Classical music seeps through the speakers that are hidden precariously throughout the room as I anxiously glance around for Ace or Kyle. I finally notice her tucked under Pedro’s arm. She looks like a stranger to me. She’s lost weight and you can tell she hasn’t been sleeping from the deep purple shadows etched under her eyes. Seeing her like this guts me, and seeing her accept comfort from Pedro just makes the pain that much more pronounced.

The pastor that has been visiting the house regularly, making arrangements for this moment, stands at the small podium and says a quick greeting, queuing people to take a seat. I walk to the front where the rest of the Bosse family congregates, now missing two key members, David and Ace, and filled with several that I’ve recently been introduced to. I take a seat next to Kendall, who immediately reaches over and grasps my hand tightly in hers.

The girls had decided to each do a piece of the eulogy. Kendall had mentioned to me that the four of them worked separately on the message they wanted to share but had come together numerous times to ensure that the entire message flowed. Ace was never around when they did; she’d been absent a lot, and when she wasn’t physically gone, she was mentally.

They give their eulogies in order of their ages beginning with Mindi. She looks composed and rigid as she begins reading from a paper that she grips so tightly I expect it to tear. Her voice hitches a few times and a few tears roll down her cheeks, but she makes it back to Kyle, who’s waiting with open arms, before she loses it.

Savannah’s next. She’s crying before she reaches the podium. I can tell it’s not only David’s loss that’s hurting the sisters today; seeing the pain havocking each other makes this even more heart wrenching for each of them.

Savannah cries, sniffs, and gasps through most of her eulogy, making it damn near impossible to understand, but the raw emotion can be understood by anyone. You don’t need to hear her words to understand the message.

Jenny’s next. She’s weepy and makes no attempt at hiding it as she smiles the first Bosse smile I’ve seen in a few weeks, and a mixture of guilt and pain grip me.

Before Kendall stands up, she squeezes my hand hard then lifts her chin and walks to the front of the room.

“Our dad had a heart of gold. Our grandma would tease that it was the Puerto Rican in him, that the French was where he got his good manners and sense of discipline.” She pauses and smiles a little as tears trickle down her cheeks. “He protected us from a myriad of things. Sometimes it was something small, like never giving me cauliflower because he knew I didn’t like it, to making sure he walked us to the bus stop every morning. He didn’t just walk us, though. He stood there and waited, because that was our dad. He would never allow anything to harm one of us.