Facing the nozzle, I lean into the pressure wash of scalding water and steam until the grime shell is gone. I don’t turn it off until my skin is too sore for one more second. I’m raw all over. But transformed too, because I feel seventeen again—not seventy or seven—too young to be dying, too old to be homesick. Or family-sick. For now it’s all scalded away.

I shave, put on fresh clothes, and leave the bathroom to find Annie digging through my life. Basketball trophies, report cards, immunization records, a badge-covered shirt from my ill-advised foray into the world of the Boy Scouts of America. She sifts through it without taking it out of the box, then moves on to the next one.

“My clothes,” I say. “I’ll do them.” I reach down and take the box from her. She doesn’t protest or ask me why I’m such a lazy piece of crap for just letting them sit here instead of unpacking like a normal human being.

From my room I can hear her taking out the contents of the next box, and I know it’s the one I don’t want unpacked because I can hear the clinking of candlesticks.

The apartment came furnished, but my mom insisted on leaving a few things to make it like home. I know exactly what’s in there because I saw her pack it up. Family portraits in matching silver frames. Her favorite candlesticks, like I’m ever in a million years going to light candles. A hand-woven silk table runner that belonged to her mother. This ancient anthology of children’s stories she read to Sarina and me when we were little. Stuff I don’t want to see right now.

“Just leave that stuff in the box,” I call from the room.

“But some of it’s really pretty. Don’t you at least want the family pictures out? And what’s this old book?”

“I don’t want to see it right now,” I yell, too loudly, and instantly regret the blatant desperation. “Please,” I try again, softer. “Just leave it.”

Silence. I stick my head out the door and I see her small body bent over the candlesticks. She’s rewrapping them in the table runner, placing them gently back into the box like she’s afraid they’ll detonate.

By the time I’ve found drawer space for all my clothes, Annie’s long done with the living room and nearly finished unpacking the kitchen boxes too.

“Thank you,” I say, sliding into a chair at the kitchen table. I know I’m alone in believing this, but people overuse those words so they mean almost nothing at a time like this, when I need them to mean everything. I can only think of a few times in my whole life I’ve ever been more grateful. She deserves a million thank-yous.

“It’s nothing. I should’ve come by sooner.”

“No. I really mean it. I don’t think I’ve ever done anything this nice for you.”

“A couple of hours of cleaning? You spent at least twenty hours tutoring me for chemistry last semester. I bombed the final, by the way.”

“What? Why didn’t you tell me?”

She shrugs. “I don’t know. It’s embarrassing.”

“How bad?”

She tucks her hair behind her ears and squeezes her eyes shut like that’ll help her forget. “You don’t want to know. And it was algebra the semester before that, and biology the semester before that, so you do nice things for me all the time.”

I let it go. But this wasn’t nice. This was heroic. Life-altering.

“So, what’s going on with you?” I ask.

“Nothing. Sorry I haven’t called. I knew you were spending every second with your family, and then this weekend has just been kind of busy.”

“You hooked up with that guy.”

“What guy?”

“The one with the plant name. Weed.”

“Reed.”

“Yeah, whatever. Him.”

She bites her lower lip in classic Annie concentration. Her face says: formulating lie, formulating lie, formulating lie, crap, can’t formulate a lie, change the subject. “I hate the term hooked up.”

“Noted.”

“No really. Can we not say hung out with?”

“We can, but it means something different. And it’s obvious you and the Weed have done both.”

“Why is that obvious?”

“Because otherwise you would have just answered the question.”

“Hmm.” She taps her fingers on the countertop. Her nails are pink. This is serious.

“So when do I get to meet him?” I ask.

“Never.”

“What? How is that even possible? As your husband, I demand to meet the dude you’re making out with. ”

“And as your wife, I demand you let it go. When do we meet with the lawyer?”

“If today is actually Monday, then tomorrow at nine in the morning. And he’s just a law student. Supposedly, I don’t need a real lawyer, just some know-it-all with legal tendencies to tell me which forms to fill out.”

“I’m kind of surprised you actually made the call.”

“I didn’t,” I admit. “I kept putting it off until my dad freaked out and at the last minute called for me. It’s in Louisville, but you don’t have to go if you’ve got work or hookup plans that interfere.”

“I’ll go with you,” she says, but I can tell she doesn’t want to. From the way she grimaced under the word “wife,” it’s clear she’s experiencing buyer’s remorse. “I’ll pick you up tomorrow at eight?”

“Sure.”

“And do I have to know anything or say anything?”

“I don’t think so. I don’t even see the point of it. I think we just show up and smile.”

“I can do that.” She exhales and her shoulders drop a little. She looks worried. “Are you going to be okay?”

I glance around me. Okay. Am I going to be okay? “Yeah?”

“Really?”

I have no idea. I don’t even know if I want to be okay. Up until an hour ago, dedicating myself to winning the love of Satan’s Cat or killing her was actually starting to sound like a viable life plan.

I lean over, rest my chin on my palm, and stare at the grout between two tiles. Grout is way less likely to make me cry than Annie’s eyes all full of sympathy and worry. “I didn’t think it was going to be this hard. Saying good-bye, I mean. But I can take care of myself.”

“I know.”

“Not that you’d believe me based on the state of this place an hour ago, but I’ll do better.”

“I believe you. But I need you to be okay okay. Like not too depressed to shower or eat or talk to humans.”

“Annie.”

“Mo.”

“My family just left. Left. They did it. It’s over. My childhood, everything, I’m—” I stop myself just short of saying what I really mean: I’m completely alone. It’s too pitiful. “I’ll be okay.”

“You’ve got me.”

I run both hands through my hair. It’s still wet and I feel the water drip down into the collar of my shirt. “I know. But my sister had to leave, and I can’t for the life of me figure out what I’ve done to deserve to be sitting here, while she’s somewhere learning how to wrap up her head so nobody sees hair.”

“So don’t waste it.”

I look up from the grout into Annie’s eyes. Sometimes she says the most brilliant things. “Okay.”

She pulls out her cell, to check the time I assume—of course, the prison guards will be waiting for her—but then she puts it up to her ear and turns to face the cabinets, as if this prevents me from hearing her conversation.

“Hi . . . Yeah, I know, but I’m going to be late . . . With Mo . . . Can’t you just tell Dad I can’t make it? . . . Because . . . Mom . . . his family left two days ago. . . . Maybe. . . . I’ll ask him. . . . I’ll call you back.”

She hangs up. “Do you want to come over to my house for dinner?”

I pretend to think about it for a couple of seconds. She pretends to believe that I’m thinking about it. And then I shake my head no.

It’s been a while since I’ve been to dinner at the Berniers’, but I’m pretty sure it hasn’t changed. Good food, bad feel. Bloodless and brittle. Lena must’ve been the heart that pumped life into those people, the walls, the air. I don’t understand where Annie fits into all of it or how she even survives, but it’s dry and colorless and fragile, and I’d rather eat Cinnamon Toast Crunch on my couch and have another staring contest with Satan’s Cat.

She nods, understands. She takes out her phone, dials her mom again, and turns back to the cabinets. “Hi . . . No, he’s got a lot to do here. Actually, I’m going to stay and help him. . . . I know. . . . I don’t care. . . . Yes, I am. . . . Tell him I’ll be back by midnight. . . . I’m eighteen. . . . Just because. . . .”

I get up and walk back into the living room. Satan’s Cat is perched on a single box in the corner, the one I wouldn’t let Annie unpack. Back when the cat was Duchess, Sarina played games with her every evening, hid her catnip toys, actually stroked her fur.

I wonder what Sarina’s doing now. I’m assuming Jordan has a plethora of nasty cats to love, but I can’t imagine she’s adopted one already. She’s probably lying in bed clutching a stuffed animal, worrying about whether or not I’ve remembered to read Duchess a bedtime story. I check my inbox to see if she’s responded to the email I sent yesterday. Nothing.

“TV?” Annie asks, flopping down on the couch.

“Sure. Don’t get in trouble over me, though. I’m okay if you have to go.”

She purses her lips and examines the remote. “I know. I’m exerting a little independence. You know, being my own woman and all that crap.”

“But they just bought you a brand-new car. Maybe you shouldn’t piss them off.”

Satan’s Cat hops off the box and onto Annie’s lap. “If I was going that route, I’d have told them I got married last week.”

“Good point,” I say, and sit down beside her. “But I don’t want them hating me any more than they already do, on the off chance they do find out and your dad is deciding whether to kill me or only cut my testicles off.”