Chapter 7: What Was in the Desk

The mattress in my old room still had the dent where I used to curl up against the wall.

I lay on top of the covers in my clothes and waited.

At eleven the door opened a crack, and my sister slid in with her pillow.

"Nor," she whispered. "Can I sleep in here?"

"You're twenty-four."

"Please. I can't be in my room tonight."

I moved over. She climbed in and pulled the quilt up under her chin, as she had when she was five and I was eight.

For a while she only breathed.

"I didn't pick the puppy," she said at last.

"What?"

"Mom did. She said it would look sweet. I said you'd hate it, and she said that was the point."

I stared at the ceiling.

"What was the point?"

"I don't know." Her voice was very small. "I never know what the point is. I just do what they say, and then they're so happy with me."

She turned her face into the pillow.

I thought of the meatballs and the pesticide and a hundred smaller things, and for one long moment I let myself hold all of it.

It did not feel like hate. It felt like pity, and I did not want it.

"Dani," I said. "What happens Saturday night?"

She went stiff.

"Nothing. A party."

"Okay."

"Do you love Colin?"

"I did," I said.

"Then why would you..." She stopped. "Never mind."

Keep reading free with an account. Start Quitting this Family after Being Abandoned for Laughs from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.