For Real(5)

But after an hour, my desire to reach out to my sister becomes unbearable, and I can’t stay quiet any longer. In one of my less eloquent moments, I blurt out, “I don’t want to, like, force you or anything. But do you want to talk about it? ’Cause I can listen. I mean, if you want.”

Miranda heaves a soul-deep sigh. “There’s nothing to talk about. He lied to me, he cheated on me, all my plans are ruined, and my life sucks. End of story.” Her voice is totally flat, and it scares me. My sister has always had a certain wild spark to her, and I can’t find even the slightest trace of it now.

“You could go to Brooklyn without him,” I say.

“I don’t have anywhere to live. Samir and I were going to stay at his uncle’s while he was in India for the year. He said he’d let us live there rent-free in exchange for dog-sitting. I’m still waiting to hear back about a bunch of publishing internships and stuff, and I can’t pay rent until I have a job.”

“Oh.” I didn’t know about the internships or the dog-sitting, and it makes me wonder how many other things Miranda hasn’t told me. “Maybe Mom and Dad could help you out at the beginning? You could find a roommate on Craigslist or something, right? I could help you look. I could help you look for apartments, too, if you want. And you could always get a job as a barista at—”

Miranda squeezes the bridge of her nose, like this conversation is giving her a headache. “Can we not talk about this?” she says. “I know you’re trying to help, but I can’t even think about it right now.”

“Sure. Sorry. I was— Sorry.” I scramble for something else to say, something that will prove to Miranda that being with me is preferable to being alone right now. Finally, out of desperation, I say, “Want to play the Limerick Game?”

I have no idea where that came from. We haven’t played the Limerick Game in years. But when we were younger, we used to play it all the time to entertain ourselves on long car trips. One of us would name a person, and the other would have one minute to come up with a limerick about that person. But as I’m cursing my stupidity—of course my distraught sister doesn’t want to play the Limerick Game—I’m surprised to see the corner of Miranda’s mouth hitch into a semi-smile.

“Wow. I haven’t thought about that in forever.” She shrugs. “All right. It’s better than thinking about my stupid life. You want to go first?”

I smile, thrilled this is working. “Sure.”

“Okay. Do Mr. Trevor. Your sixty seconds start … now.”

Mr. Trevor is the ancient PE teacher at our high school. I suffered through his class sophomore year, and Miranda had him twice. He wears fluorescent tracksuits and is always blowing this horrible, shrieky whistle—he no longer has the lung capacity to yell all day, since he’s spent forty years chain-smoking behind the gym.

“And … go!” Miranda commands one minute later. I dramatically clear my throat.

“There once was a man named Ron Trevor,



Who swore he’d teach high school forever.



You’d think he’d aspire



To someday retire,



But if you asked when, he’d say, ‘Never!’ ”



Miranda laughs. “Well done. Give me one.”

“Okay, do Joss Whedon.”

My sister’s eyebrows furrow. “Who?”

“Really? You don’t know who that is?”

She shrugs. “An actor?”

“Buffy? Firefly? Angel? The Avengers?”

“What, he was in those?”

I have to forcibly restrain myself from smacking my forehead. “No, Mira, he wrote them. He’s really, really famous.”

“God, sorry! Not everyone has watched every episode of every TV show ever. Just give me someone else, okay? Someone real?”

“Screenwriters are real!”

“Someone we know, Claire!”

Considering how popular Miranda has always been, you’d think she’d care at least a little bit about pop culture. I’m about to make a comment to that effect, but I remind myself that my sister deserves to be let off the hook tonight. “Fine. Do Barack Obama. You know who that is, right?”

She rolls her eyes. After I time out a minute, she recites:

“There once was a guy named Obama,



Who met the esteemed Dalai Lama.



They talked about Zen



And the purpose of men,



Then traded bad jokes ’bout yo mama.”



We fly through the dark, tossing limericks back and forth for nearly an hour, and I watch my sister’s tight shoulders start to relax. The rhymes become increasingly ridiculous as we get tired, and every time Miranda laughs, I feel a warm glow of satisfaction deep in the center of my chest. Finally, around two in the morning, she announces, “I want to do one for Samir.”

“All right,” I say. Maybe she’ll open up and talk to me about the breakup if I don’t make a big deal out of this. “Your sixty seconds start … now.”

When her time is up, Miranda recites in a steady voice:

“There once was a jerk named Samir.



If he drowned in the ocean, I’d cheer.