Read SSC (2012) Adult Onset Online

Authors: Ann-Marie MacDonald

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SSC (2012) Adult Onset (46 page)

BOOK: SSC (2012) Adult Onset
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The marks on a body are the marks on a map. They tell you where you have been, and how to get home again so that you can stop going round inside yourself. Look down at the map. Look up at the sky. Where is the sun? Now walk. Make a new pathway, walk out of the forest.

She can go back to Germany, land of horror and sweetness, where a
Mädchen
in white waits, a person of two and a half. Together they can look down at the stone, flush against the grass.

Ask me whatever you want, I will answer
.

Your arm hurts because it is broken
.

No, he does not need to breathe down there
.

No, you did not do this
.

That is what remains of his body, his soul has left it
.

His body has returned to the earth to make more grass and food and air and rain
.

That is where all the flowers have gone
.

But you will always have one in your name
.

Maggie is drawing hieroglyphs in Mary Rose’s datebook, which she has looted from her bag. Mary Rose tips the contents onto the kitchen floor and sits cross-legged next to the child.

“Purse,” says Maggie.

“Bag,” says Mary Rose. “That is a lesbian word for ‘purse.’ ”

Hil says, “I’m a lesbian and I have a purse.”

Mary Rose looks up. “Did you feel that just now?”

“What?”

“Happy.”

Re: Some things really do get batter

Dear Dad,

Sometimes things need to get worse before they can get better.

Love,

Mary Rose

End

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Thank you. Without whom …

Beatrice Ahad

Katherine Ashenburg

Bill Bolton Women’s Hockey League

Tracy Bohan

Susan Burns

Sarah Chalfant

Trudy Chernin

Anne Collins

Trish Convery

Louise Dennys

Jerry Doiron

Margaret Anne Fitzpatrick-Hanly

Margaret Gaffney

Ken Girotti

Mary Giuliano

Robert Gordon

Janet Hanna

Kendra Hawke

Kate Icely

Honora Johannesen

Mara Nicolaou

Arland O’Hara

Alanna Palmer

Alisa Palmer

Marven Palmer

Pam Plant

Maria Popoff

Lisa Robertson

John Robinson

Wendy Katherine

Sharon Klein

Sarka Kalusova

Eleanor Koldofsky

Melanie Lane

Amanda Lewis

Mary Paula Lizewski

Isabel MacDonald-Palmer

John-Hugh MacDonald

Lora MacDonald-Palmer

Malcolm MacDonald

Mary MacDonald

Jackie Maxwell

Nancy McKinnon

Clare Meridew

Gordon Meslin

Rowda Mohamud

Deirdre Molina

Montana

Cassandra Nicolaou

Harriet Sachs

Matthew Sibiga

Olivia Smith-Lizewski

Stormy

Lillian Szpak

Sister Walsh

Maureen White

Andrew Wylie

PERMISSIONS

Bensahel, H., Y. Desgrippes, P. Jehanno, G.F. Pennecot. “Solitary bone cyst: controversies and treatment.”
Journal of Pediatric Orthopaedics B 7
, no. 4 (October 1998): 257–261. Used by permission of the publisher.

“The Hut-Sut Song.” Music and lyrics by Leo V. Killion, Ted McMichael and Jack Owens. © 1939, 1941 (renewed) Chappell & Co. All rights reserved. Used by permission of Alfred Music and The Songwriters Guild of America.

Lyrics from
Won’t You Be My Neighbor?
by Fred M. Rogers, © McFeely Rogers Foundation; used with permission.

Unicameral Bone Cyst
. Boston Children’s Hospital.

http://www.childrenshospital.org/health-topics/conditions/unicameral-bone-cyst
. Used with permission.

Bone Cyst
. NHS Direct Wales.
http://www.nhsdirect.wales.nhs.uk/encyclopaedia/b/article/bonecyst/
. Reproduced by kind permission of the Department of Health, © 2014.

Mehlman CT. Unicameral Bone Cyst.
Medscape Reference
. Updated May 10, 2013. Available at:
http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/1257331-overview
. Used with permission.

Fleisher, Gary R. and Stephen Ludwig.
Textbook of Pediatric Emergency Medicine
, 6
th
ed. Philadelphia: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2010. Used by permission of the publisher.

Skeletal Radiology
by INTERNAL SKELETAL SOCIETY. Reproduced with permission of SPRINGER-VERLAG in the format Book via Copyright Clearance Center.

Degner, Dr. Daniel A.
Bone Cysts in Dogs
. Vet Surgery Central Inc.
http://www.vetsurgerycentral.com/oncology_bone_cyst.htm
. Used by permission of the author.

 

ANN-MARIE M
AC
DONALD
is a bestselling, award-winning novelist, playwright, actor and broadcaster. Her works include
Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet), Fall On Your Knees
and
The Way the Crow Flies
. She lives in Toronto with her wife and their two children.

BOOK: SSC (2012) Adult Onset
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