Grace makes tea. They sit at the old kitchen table, the one that she and Eleanor shared their meals at, the one that Eleanor would play under while Grace chatted with her friends. It feels so strange to be on the other side of the table, more adult than she’s used to feeling.
Eleanor feels so much older and younger than her sixteen years. Her memories as her Sisters clash with her memories as Father, but even below that, even deeper, down to the center of her being into something that is inextricably her, something that grew up too fast and not at all. Is it something she’ll grow into with time and experience? She doesn’t have the courage to ask.
She relays her story with calm detachment. Contacting Tenenbaum, reviving Father, betraying Mother. When she finds herself at a loss for what to say, she drinks her tea and lets the warmth settle in her belly. Dr. Tenenbaum tells her tea tastes so much better on the surface. She can’t wait to find that out for herself.
Eleanor stumbles through the last leg of the story. Mother attempting to smother her with a pillow, Father apprehended, their desperate escape attempt, and finally, losing him—at least in a sense.
He’s still here, a shadow on the wall, a tangle of memories that she can theoretically predict will react. She knew this is how it would be from the moment she harvested his ADAM, but she smiled at him, told him it would be alright, because she couldn’t stand the idea that his last memory would be one of her upset.
