American Girls(69)

“I do, but I can control myself around Roger, believe it or not.” She gave an eye roll of self-disgust. “I even told Dex that I’d been shooting with him, before we came back here, of course. And about Mom.”

Mom.

I needed to pack, but I just wanted to sit down. My sister moved her feet and I curled up on the other end of the sofa.

“What did he say?”

“He said that I must really not trust him. Irony, right?”

“But you don’t, do you?”

“I don’t trust life,” she said.

My sister tossed her baby-blue blanket in my direction. The fabric smelled faintly of vanilla, her perfume, and I felt for a minute like I was going to cry, like I wanted to bottle that scent and take it home with me, to keep a little part of my sister close, no matter how big a disaster she was. I felt that way when I smelled the top of Birch’s head as well. He had that powdery baby smell, and I wanted to hug him so hard when he was sleeping that I sometimes worried I would break him. I could remember smelling him like that, but I couldn’t get the scent, the same way I knew that by the time I was on the plane I would have lost that feeling around the smell of my sister’s blanket.

Maybe she wasn’t the disaster. Maybe I was.

“Are you ready to go back?”

“I’m almost packed,” I said. “I pack really fast. I promise.”

She shook her head.

“That’s not what I meant.”

I knew what she meant.

“I don’t know. I kept thinking Mom would apologize at some point. And now Doon is mad at me too. I miss them all so much, and I want things to be like they were before, way before, and I know that’s not even possible because it doesn’t exist anymore. I just feel like Mom can be the nicest person and then the craziest too.”

“Because she can be.”

“But does the crazy make the nice not true? I read about all these awful families this summer, and I know ours isn’t that bad. It’s not like Dad’s a pervert or Mom locks me in a closet, but sometimes I still feel like neither of them is really trying that hard. And then I think to myself, ‘Well, it’s not like it’s their job to try,’ and then I think after that, ‘But wait a minute, yes, it is,’ and then I just get so mad at both of them that I want to run away again, only someplace farther away and with more money. Don’t look at me like that, it’s not like I’m going to do it. I want to see my brother and I want to figure out how to survive this new, stupid school, but I also want my parents to just work a little harder at being my parents. And then I just feel like a jerk.”

Delia waited before she spoke. “I think you can’t expect more from people than they’re able to give. And you’re happier if you don’t hate them for it.”

I thought about it for a minute. It was the kind of thing people said that you knew was probably true, but still didn’t help very much.

“And if all else fails,” she said, “I can loan you my credit card and you can come back next summer.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

I gave her the hardest hug I’ve probably ever given her in my life, and she hugged me back just as tightly. I wanted someone to love her, too, to keep her safe.

“I almost forgot,” she said, breaking away and getting her bag from across the room. “Dex said to give you this.” She tossed a T-shirt in my direction. “Too Many Rich Crackers.” “He said to wear it the first day of school and to think of him.”

“Right,” I said. “I’ll make sure to have a backup form of social suicide, though, just in case.”

Delia yawned and laughed at the same time, then went back to her place on the sofa.

“If you ever talk to him again, tell him thank you.”

“I know he’s a good guy,” my sister said. “That’s what makes it harder, believe it or not. I spent half my life swearing I would never end up like Cora.”

Her voice was soft. I thought for a minute that she was going to cry.

“Jeremy and I were talking last night,” I said. “He said the hardest thing in life is figuring out how to be regular.”

“Because he’s clearly an expert,” Delia said. “And haven’t I been nice in not asking you where your pants are?”

“You said this was a dress.”

“Obviously, I was wrong. So where did you go? Did you two lovebirds have fun?”

I thought about trying to explain the whole night to her, but it seemed like it would just sound like the most fantastic lie.

“We did.”

“Should we have a talk?”

“It wasn’t that fun. Scout’s honor.”

I gave her the Chips Ahoy! salute and sat next to her on the sofa. The house was quiet and still, like the morning after a hurricane blew through town. Adrenaline was rapidly giving way to fatigue, and I slumped against my sister’s side, which was softer and more pliant than I’d imagined. She wrapped an arm around me and rubbed the top of my arm, slowly and rhythmically, humming a song that our mother used for Birch. Hush, little baby, don’t say a word. I was almost asleep when my sister stopped humming.

“Anna. I’m not trying to make you mad, so please don’t take this the wrong way, okay?”