Does This Have Gluten Free?

After Lindsay’s second time throwing up, the man tells Lauren that someone must stay with her and that he will do it. He carries her into the girls’ bedroom, grabs the green bucket, slides into the lower bunk, and lays Lindsay against his ribs with her head tucked beneath his arm.

A few minutes go by. Lindsay breathes softly. Then, she starts to squirm, subtly at first, then more uncomfortably until finally her face contorts. The man grabs the bucket and gets it to her chin just as she starts to throw up.

This process happens again—starting with peaceful sleep and ending in vomiting—about twenty minutes later. Two more times into it, the man has learned that she will start to squirm almost exactly nineteen minutes after she finishes vomiting. This lasts from 11 pm until 4:30 in the morning.

There must be something wrong. Really wrong. She is his third child and neither Grant nor Lucia did anything like this. After her premature birth, she had spent a week in the NICU. He has always worried about her, always thought something was after her.

Nine months later, she will seem perfectly healthy as he and Lauren go out together while in Maine. Then she throws up. Two months later, she is throwing up once a week. They bring her to a new doctor in Bridgewater, and at age 4, she is diagnosed with celiac disease. She will spend the next year holding up foods and saying, “Does this have gluten free?”