August 8th, 1891

Clara sat on the floor on the other side of Andrews's door with her doll and her bookbag, scowling at the locked handle. He'd been quiet for DAYS and even though her father said that he was on the mend, she still couldn't go into see him. It'd been nearly a week now since his family had left, and melancholy had descended upon the whole house like a stubborn fog.

"Hey!" she called. There was only a muffled groan from the other side of the door. "What are you doing in there?" No answer. "I'm sure you're bored because I sure am. You need to get better soon."

"I'm stuck in bed." Came the muffled reply.

"Do you feel ok?"

He made a noncommittal noise. Clara frowned nervously and twisted the fabric of her skirt in her hands as she tried to come up with a way to cheer him up, before finally lighting on an idea and reaching into her school bag.

"That's not a very good answer, you know." She drew a large letter T on her slate and slid it under the door, then a piece of chalk. "Here's a game."

There was the sound of scuffling, then the flop of cloth, and a slate sliding across the floor. "What's this supposed to be?"

"You pick a word or phrase or something and I try to guess what it is. Draw the spaces on the board and write in the letters I guess so I can try to figure out what you're saying."

"I can't give it back to you though."

"Oh." Clara squinted under the crack in an attempt to figure out how to rig a system so they could get things to each other. "Well then how did you get the slate in the first place?"

"I dragged it over with a blanket, but unless I have a stick or hook or something and can't push it back. Thank you though. It was a nice idea."

Clara scrambled to her feet. "I'll be right back!"

"What? Where-"

She didn't hear the rest of his question, or her parent's questioning cries, as she bolted down the stairs. She paused for a second at the front door to pull on her hat and shoes, then ran down the block to the green. It didn't take her long to find a suitably low tree and a suitably thin branch. She eyed it up for a second before jumping to grab the object of her attention. The branch snapped off under her weight, and she fell back to the ground to land flatly on her butt.

She stood up and tried to brush the offending mud stain off her skirt before seizing her prize and running back home. In her breathless excitement at her fantastic new idea, she nearly ran into her father on her way back through the front door.

"Clara?! You know better than to go running off without telling your mother and I where you're going. We were worried. What were you doing?"

"Oh, I JUST went to the park! I wasn't even gone for 10 minutes!" She tried to hide her stick behind her back.

"Why do you have a branch?" He fixed her with the look of curious concern that let her know there would be no evading his interrogation.

Foiled again. "Beeacaaaussse." She tried to edge away but her father caught her, took her stick, and held it above her head. She gave a cry of protest and jumped up at it but to no avail.

"Because WHY?"

"Because Andrew needs it." She stopped trying to grab at her prize and crossed her arms instead. "Can I have it back?"

A Stern look.

"Please?"

"Tell us where you're going next time."

"Yes, father," came the dutiful response.

"And don't bring more things indoors that don't belong indoors, I might have been able to find you a yardstick or something else."

"Yes father."

Her patience was rewarded and her father gave back the branch. Clara seized her prize with a rushed thank you, and sprinted back up the stairs. She called for Andrew and slid the stick under the door.

"Look! Now you can push things back to me! Put them on the ground and shove them under the door with the branch! It's perfect."

She heard the sound of muffled laughing, a pause, and pretty soon the scraping of her slate as it was shoved back towards her. The corner peeked out from the crack, so she pulled it out the rest of the way. On it was drawn a silly portrait of her with two words scrawled in his angular large, all capital letter printing.

Thank you.

The stick and blanket method worked well for the next several weeks as Andrew began to regain his strength and health again. Still bedbound, but more energetic every day, he started to hold longer and longer conversations, and keep up with the schoolwork that Clara brought back for him every day. She sat on the floor outside his door with her doll or embroidery or homework and chatted with him while she worked, and he appreciated the company after a long day of boredom and napping.

And the days passed.

As he regained his strength, Mr. Lemay recommended that he might try humming to exercise his lungs. Laying still for so long would leave him weak otherwise, and it would be a way to occupy himself, after all. Andrew gratefully welcomed the suggestion and in the following days, hummed, then sang, through ever song he knew. Faced again with the prospect of boredom and the insistence of the good doctor to continue his practice, he turned to making up his own songs over the course of the day. He performed them for Clara in the afternoons when she came home, and the daily recital gave them both something to look forward to each day.

And the days passed.

Finally, finally, he was able to come out of bed as Mr. Lemay deemed him well enough to interact with others face to face again and threw open the door to what they'd begun calling the "Cell". He carried Andrew out of the room in a nest of blankets to seat him on the couch in the parlor, and Clara gleefully followed her father down the stairs as Andrew laughed in delight the whole way. Once situated comfortably, Clara happily clambered onto the couch to sit next to him and now, without the offending door to the Cell in their way, they were finally able to play – almost, almost, like they once did in the schoolyard and the park. Playing Town was added to their activities, as was reading to each other, slowly but surely working through the Adventures of Tom Sawyer over the next days.

And the days passed.

Though the fever had broken and the worst of the sickness passed, Andrew still couldn't understand why he was always so tired. Why he hurt so much. Each morning, Mr. Lemay would bring him down to the parlor to say goodbye before he and Clara went to work and school. He spent the days with her mother, helping with small stationary tasks, like hulling peas, ripping seams, or folding clothes. It was nice, sitting in the sun that streaked through the kitchen window, having things to occupy his time, being helpful, but by midmorning, his hands ached from the work, and his legs were numb, or worse, spasming from sitting on them. Sleep, and playing with Clara when she came home and woke him up, helped to distract him from the pain. But the pain persisted.

And the days passed.

When would his family come back? It'd been over a month now. How long could it possibly take to go West and set up a small farmhouse? Not more than a few weeks, surely? And they would have sent some letters by now. Wouldn't they? Any time now. He tried to content himself with the thought that he'd be much stronger whenever they did call for him. He'd be better. That's right. He'd be ready.

The days passed.

A/N: Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed this last chapter and that you're staying safe and healthy!