Far from the Tree(10)

“You’re fidgeting,” Grace’s mom said.

“I’m not fidgeting, you’re fidgeting,” she replied.

“You’re both fidgeting,” her dad said. “Stop it.”

“But you have lint on your—” her mom interrupted him, reaching for his shirt. He playfully batted her hand away.

“Fidgeting,” he said.

The three of them were standing on a stone front porch, huddled together even though there was plenty of room to spread out. Grace probably could have done a cartwheel without taking out either one of her parents. That’s how big the porch was.

And it wasn’t just any front porch. It was Maya’s front porch. Or, more accurately, Maya’s family’s front porch. A week after she and Grace had exchanged emails, Maya’s parents had invited her family to dinner, and they had accepted because, well, how exactly does one turn down that invitation?

Maya and Grace had talked a few times, starting with Maya’s response to Grace’s first email: Well, it’s about time. It had been short and to the point, which Grace was starting to realize was Maya’s usual mode of response. And she didn’t use emojis or smiley faces made of semicolons and parentheses, either. Grace was beginning to wonder if her sister was really a humorless robot, but she assumed that even robots knew how to send the winking emoji. Maybe Maya was just super serious about technology. Or maybe she was one of those people who collected typewriters and longed for a landline like they used thirty years ago.

Grace had a lot of questions for (and about) Maya, and she wasn’t sure how to ask any of them.

When they pulled up to the house, Grace’s dad whistled under his breath and her mom said, “Oh my God, I knew you should have worn a suit.”

“Dad hates wearing suits” is what Grace would have said if she hadn’t been busy staring at the house. It was a sort of stone mansion—only one turret short of being something out of a Disney movie.

And it was where Maya lived.

“I hate wearing suits,” her dad said. The three of them were still sitting in the car. Grace’s breath was fogging up the glass; that’s how close she was to the window. It took them another few minutes to make it to the epic front porch, and when her mom rang the bell, the sound of chimes that came from inside the house played “Ode to Joy.”

“Did we accidentally go to church instead?” Grace whispered.

“You okay?” her dad said, turning to her as the doorbell continued to sing out.

“Yeah, fine.”

“You sure?”

“Ask me again in an hour,” Grace whispered, just as the door was flung open and a smiling couple greeted them. They were both redheads. The man was wearing a suit.

Grace heard her mom swear very softly behind her.

“Well, you found the place!” the woman said. “Come in, come in!” She was A Lot, as Janie used to say. (And as she probably still said. Grace hadn’t talked to Janie in . . . a long time.)

“It’s so nice to meet you!” the woman said. “I’m Diane, this is Bob.”

They were both smiling at Grace like they wanted to eat her.

Grace smiled back.

She followed her parents into the house, which shone and gleamed and had the vague air of a mausoleum, thanks to all the marble. There was a double spiral staircase that wound up to a second-floor landing, also marble, and along the staircase, Grace could see a large portrait wall covered in professionally framed pictures.

There was not a dust ball in sight.

“Your home is so lovely,” said Grace’s mother, who read Architectural Digest the way—well, Grace had never met anyone who consumed anything the way her mom read Architectural Digest. Anyway, Grace’s mother was dying. Grace could see her mentally ripping out the carpet in their living room, adding a second wing, or quite possibly abandoning Grace’s father and her to live in this house instead. “This is just magnificent.”

Grace had never heard her mother use the word magnificent before.

Her dad took over. “Yes, thanks so much for having us over. Grace has really been looking forward to it.”

Grace had, in a way, like the way she would look forward to a drop in a roller coaster. Only she wasn’t sure how good the seat belts were on this ride, or when was the last time anyone had done a safety inspection of the track.

Luckily, her manners snapped into place, and she stepped forward and offered her hand to Diane. “Hi, I’m Grace,” she said. “It’s so nice to meet you.”

Diane’s eyes looked wet as she shook her hand. “Grace,” she said, her voice cracking a little. “It is so, so lovely to meet you. I know Maya is looking forward to it, too. I think this’ll be really good for her.”

Good for her? Grace saw trouble just around the bend.

“She looks just like her,” Bob said. “Isn’t it uncanny, Di?”

Grace smiled again, not sure what to say. She had no idea if that was true or not. She and Maya still hadn’t exchanged pictures yet, and she had been scared to look her up on social media.

Grace wasn’t sure why.

Just then, a girl came around the corner, also a redhead. Grace took a deep breath without realizing it. Did Maya have red hair? Was this her? Bob had said she looked just like Maya, but this girl and Grace couldn’t have looked more different.