Excerpt: Monsters of Fruit Punch

The next year—the one ending in five—it was raining. It was also the year he lost his patience with me. To give credit where it was due, that had taken nearly twenty years.
We stood on the hill, a little away from the graves, getting slightly less wet under an ancient birch. It didn’t do to argue near them, after all. The flowers he’d brought for Millie’s grave were delicate things, halfway to being ruined.
As always, I stayed quiet until he acknowledged me.
“I know that you are hiding a great deal from me, Mr Williams,” he said.
“Sir.”
“I should like very much to know what it is—no, I intend to know what it is. What harm can there be in telling an old, dying man?”
“You’re not dying yet, sir.”
“How should you know? You only come one morning a year.”
“I promise, Dr Baldwin. When the time is right.”
“And I am to trust that you know when that is?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Very well, then.” And, after a few moments, “What do you remember best about Millie?”
“Her eyes,” I answered, without hesitation. “They were usually laughing at me… and always beautiful.”
He nodded. “She had her mother’s eyes.”
“I wish I could have met her.”
He laughed, a low chuckle that did not, thankfully, set off another coughing spasm. “She would not have liked you, I think.”
“Sir?”
“You do not tell the truth,” he said, his own eyes sparkling.