Chapter 4: Mom Comes Down

Mom's car pulled up at eight the next morning.

By eight-fifteen she had a casserole in the oven and all five of us in the kitchen.

She stood at the head of the table in her good church cardigan with her hands flat on the wood.

"I'm not going to ask whose fault it is," she said. "Families don't keep score. They certainly don't count cookies."

"Mom, it wasn't about the cookie," I said.

"Then what was it about, honey?"

I looked around the table.

Tobias had his arms crossed and kept his eyes on the salt shaker.

Chad was in the doorway with his coffee, not quite in the room.

Zelda sat with her phone face down, and Lacey sat very straight with a tissue folded in her hand.

I had practiced this in the shower.

I had practiced it in four different versions, and in every version the last line was "never mind."

"Since March I've paid Lacey's third of the rent," I said.

Nobody moved.

"Five hundred and twenty dollars a month. Every month. I covered it because she said she would pay me back after her promotion."

Mom's mouth went small.

"She never got the promotion," I said. "And I never asked about it, because I didn't want it to be awkward."

Tobias looked up. "Is that true?"

He asked it to Lacey, not me.

Lacey pressed the tissue under one eye.

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