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“What are you going to do?”
Sighing, he adjusts his tie again and reaches for the door. “Keep playing the game, bud. That’s all I can do.” When he gets out, he leans in and says, “Hey, find out what Ruthie’s up to this time, will you? I need a laugh.”
I give him a hard look, because he might be my best friend, but she’s my little sister. I don’t laugh at her. Not even when she called me up one time saying she thought it would be a good business idea to sell sex toys that look like other things. Carrots. Churros. You name it, and it’s still a no. “I won’t help you laugh at her any more than I’d help her laugh at you.”
He just smiles at me and taps the roof, shutting the door.
When I get home, I sit in the car for a minute, feeling uncertain about going upstairs. I want her to be there, and I don’t.
Finally, I climb the steps.
Mira is stretched out on the couch, a blanket spread over her in a way the reveals her curved shape. She’s watching something on the TV.
John Dies at the End.
My mouth lifts up of its own accord as she presses pause. “So you’re one of those people who rents the movie the night before book club.”
“We’re having a book club?” she asks, sitting up and propping her cast on the coffee table. “You should have warned me. I make a mean cheese dip.”
“Is that something you planned on putting together for our hypothetical Thanksgiving dinner?”
“I will if it’ll convince you.”
I set my keys on the side table by the door, think it over, and then sit in my chair rather than next to her on the couch.
“That’s your favorite chair, isn’t it?” she asks thoughtfully. “You always have your eyes on it.”
Partly because she’s taken to sitting there.
“I’m partial to it,” I admit.
“I already read the book,” she says, gesturing at the screen. “I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have the slightest idea what was happening in this movie if I hadn’t.”
It shouldn’t matter. But there are billions of books out there, with several new ones out every day. I can’t help but feel pleased she chose one I’d recommended to her. “You obviously hated it if you wanted to watch the movie too,” I say, leaning back, my gaze hooked on her—the slightly wispier hair at the sides of her face, shorter, her big eyes with the cat-eye makeup. The tiny bump on the bridge of her nose.
“Obviously.” Her gaze drops to my wrist guard. “Your wrist is fucked up, huh?”
“Only mildly. My psyche is in much worse shape.”
Her laughter fills me. “You and me both, my friend.” She pauses, scrutinizing me. “I’ve been wanting to know…Why’d your mother throw a ceramic turkey at your head?”
She surprises me by leaning over the arm of the couch and the chair and lifting a hand to my face, her fingers brushing over the scar. I’ve never liked touching it. Sometimes memories flash through me so vividly it’s as if they’re happeningnow. And I can see my mother’s screaming face, smell her breath stinking of whiskey. But it doesn’t feel like that when Mira touches it—it feels nice.
“How’d you know?” I ask, disarmed. I didn’t tell her it had scarred me or where.
“I didn’t, but that’s what it’s from, isn’t it?”
I nod, my throat constricting as she pulls her fingers away.
“Why’d she do it?”
“You think she had a good reason?” I ask, deadpan.
“No, but I’ll bet she had a bad one.”
A smile sneaks up on me, because she’s funny in a way I appreciate, and I nod. “She did. I did something illegal, and I got caught. She was worried the authorities would put me away. I’d been giving my parents money, and she didn’t want the flow to be cut off. Neither of my parents did.”
“Youdid something illegal?” she sputters, sitting up. “But you seem like such a rule follower.”
