I had spent the whole night imagining I might have to protect him from embarrassment.
Instead, I was the one who could barely stand.
Danny hugged me.
Hard.
His chin hit my shoulder.
I whispered, “You made this?”
“Yes.”
“All of it?”
“Mostly.”
I pulled back.
“What does mostly mean?”
He smiled.
“Mr. Alvarez helped with the saw.”
Of course.
Mr. Alvarez lived four houses down.
Retired carpenter.
Eighty-two.
Missing two fingers.
I suddenly understood the garage.
The sawdust.
Mom keeping the key.
The mysterious trips to Ferry Road.
“You worked with Mr. Alvarez?”
“Tuesday and Thursday.”
“Since January?”
“Sometimes Saturday.”
I looked at Mom.
She was laughing through tears.
“You knew?”
“Obviously.”
“You told me he was doing a project.”
“He was.”
“I thought school project.”
“That sounds like your problem.”
I wanted to be angry.
I couldn’t.
Danny picked up the little sparrow.
“I did this one three times.”
“Why?”
“The first one looked like a potato.”
I laughed.
“The second?”
“Dead potato.”
I nearly fell apart again.
He handed me the third one.
It still barely looked like a bird.
It was perfect.
After the ceremony, people kept stopping Danny.
Not me.
Danny.
Ellie’s brother from Parsons asked him how he burned the letters into the wood.
Marcus’s sister wanted to see the hinges.
Our principal shook his hand.
Danny answered every question with complete seriousness.
At one point, a girl from my chemistry class said, “Your gift was the best one.”
Danny frowned.
“No.”
She looked confused.
“No?”
He pointed toward the stage.
“Marcus got a boat thing. That was good.”
The shadow box.
“And Ellie’s picture was very good.”
Then he shrugged.
“They’re different.”
I was standing six feet away.
That was when I realized Danny understood the thing I had been afraid everyone else wouldn’t.
The gifts weren’t supposed to compete.
I had turned them into a competition because that was what I did with everything.
I measured.
Ranked.
Compared.
Danny had literally broken the ruler.
On the drive home, the wooden box sat on my lap.
Mom drove.
Danny sat in the back seat eating fries.
I kept opening the lid.
“MARIANNE IS NOT THE BEST BECAUSE SHE IS FIRST.”
“SHE IS THE BEST BECAUSE SHE COMES BACK.”
Finally, I asked, “Who helped you write this?”
Danny stopped chewing.
“What?”
“The sentence.”
“Nobody.”
“Really?”
He looked offended.
“I know words.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“Marianne.”
I turned.
He pointed a fry at me.
“I have Down syndrome. I am not a baby.”
The car went silent.
Mom looked at me in the mirror.
I felt horrible.
“I know.”
Danny raised his eyebrows.
“Do you?”
That hurt.
Because sometimes, apparently, I didn’t.
“I think I worry too much.”
“Yes.”
“About you.”
“Yes.”
“I thought tonight might be hard.”
“It was.”
I blinked.
“What?”
“The microphone was too tall.”
Mom burst out laughing.
Danny grinned.
I turned around fully.
“I’m sorry.”
“For the microphone?”
“No.”
He waited.
“For deciding what you could handle before asking you.”
His face softened.
“Okay.”
“And for thinking people might compare your gift.”
“They did.”
My stomach tightened.
“They did?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
He shrugged.
“Everybody.”
I must have looked horrified because he laughed.
“People compare stuff.”
He pointed at the box.
“Doesn’t change it.”
That was Danny.
Every once in a while, he’d say something so simple that it made the rest of us sound ridiculous.
The next morning, I went into the garage.
For months, it had been forbidden territory.
Now the door was open.
There were wood scraps everywhere.
Sandpaper.
Pencils.
A burned piece of oak with the name MARRIANE spelled wrong.
Two failed sparrows.
Danny had been right.
The first looked like a potato.
The second looked like a potato that had experienced something terrible.
I kept both.
Mr. Alvarez came over while I was standing there.
“You finally see it?”
“The box?”
“The work.”
I nodded.
He showed me everything Danny had done.
The first crooked cuts.
The practice hinges.
The letters he burned again and again until they were readable.
“Did you do much for him?”
Mr. Alvarez shook his head.
“I ran the dangerous tools.”
“That’s it?”
“I showed him once. Sometimes twice.”
He picked up one of the failed carvings.
“Kid is stubborn.”
I smiled.
“That part runs in the family.”
Mr. Alvarez looked at me.
