they thought it unhealthy to dwell on, she knew the scores had surprised even them. But she also had wiry, brittle hair and a small, sharp nose. She wore glasses. She had bony shoulders that gave her prominent angel wings, contributing to the family nickname. As to which would prove in the end more useful, being smart enough and very beautiful or very smart and not too attractive, she hadn’t yet figured out.
“I’m so sorry. It’s been insanely busy. Rehearsals—well, you know. I’ve missed you, though, baby. I brought a loaf of whole-grain and some sawbies,” Vic said, using the word Mara used to say when she was a toddler, before she could say “strawberries.”
“We already have sawbies,” said Mara, flinging one arm behind her toward her parents’—her mother’s—bedroom, with a play on the words she knew her sister would get.
“Jeez,” Vic said. And then, “Mom?” And in a louder, more authoritative tone, “Mom.”
After a long moment, the bedroom door pushed open, the hinges squeaking a little in protest, making Mara think of muscles stiff from disuse. Her mother swept in, arms open. She wore jeans and a fresh, long-sleeved white shirt. Her tangled hair, blond with a few scattered strands of silver, fell to just below her shoulders; her face was splotchy and mirror-shiny at once. “Vic!” she said almost manic-gaily, adding, “Mara!” a moment later, as though Mara had just arrived as well. She pulled both daughters into her arms, rocking them for a moment, and then said in a bright tone, “What time is it, girls? Shall we have some breakfast?”
“Breakfast?” Vic glanced at Mara. “What’d you eat today?”
Mara didn’t respond. Vic didn’t know how bad it had gotten.
Vic shook her head. “C’mon,” she said. “Let’s wash the berries.”
Their mom followed them into the kitchen—as if she were the kid, Mara thought—and sat, crossing her arms on top of the table. Vic pulled a brush from her purse and handed it to Mara. “You brush,” she said, gesturing toward their mother’s head. “I’ll do food.”
Mara took the brush and pulled out some of Vic’s golden auburn hair, twirling it around her finger and setting it carefully on the table. Then she held the brush over her mother’s scalp for a second. Mara was uncoordinated; that was another thing about her. While Vic was a dancer who seemed to control her body as easily as she might lift a cup to her lips, Mara had trouble cutting along a straight line for school projects. Sometimes she wondered how she and Vic could be sisters. She lowered the brush and began slowly working on her mother’s hair. Her mother allowed it, even leaned her head back a little, her eyes narrowing as she watched Vic at the sink.
“Have you gotten thinner over the last couple weeks?” their mother asked.
Vic shrugged. “Same as always, I think,” she said over her shoulder. “Though Alex has been working us.” She bent to a lower cabinet to find a colander.
“Hmm.” Her mother tapped her fingers on the table. “Are you . . .” she paused, “. . . seeing anyone?”
Mara stared at Vic, eager to hear how Vic would answer. She liked catching little bits of a world removed, one in which she didn’t yet have to participate. She was also curious because Mara knew something that her mother, caught up in her own drama, had failed to notice. Mara knew—at least she was pretty sure—that Vic liked Jonas. At another time, a pre-Dad-leaving time, this would have been big news. Vic and Jonas had been friends since high school, when he lived four blocks away and they used to share meals at each other’s houses, do homework together. Jonas had even seen Vic with pimple cream on her nose. No big deal.
About three weeks ago, though, Vic came to visit and brought Jonas with her, and Mara saw that something had changed. When Mara walked into the living room, they were standing near the window, their fingers barely touching, and they were looking at each other in a certain way that startled Mara, then scared her for a second, and then made her feel like giggling—from embarrassment, mainly. But she was glad. Jonas was sweet. Jonas was the only one who seemed to notice Mara—at one point during the visit, he knelt down to Mara and asked, “How’s it going?” and when she shrugged, he squeezed her shoulder and said, “It will get better. Promise.” Mara thought if she had a brother, she wouldn’t mind him being like Jonas.
Vic waved her right hand in the air dismissively. “Dancing is taking up all my time right now.”
“Well,” said their mother, and then she stopped, but she looked pleased. “How are rehearsals coming?”
“Good.” Vic brightened. “Want to come opening night? It’s Tuesday, remember.”
“Is your father . . .?”
Vic sighed audibly. “No, Mom.” She turned on the kitchen faucet and began rinsing the strawberries.
“Just—just asking,” their mother said. Then she closed her eyes and leaned her head back a little into Mara’s brushing. She seemed to relax, and that allowed Mara to relax, too. Mara thought about the sense of peace that came from listening to Vic busy herself at the kitchen sink, and she thought about what it would be like to be grown-up and to be the one who brought that comfort to someone else. She tried to imagine herself Vic’s age, but it seemed too far away to envision. When she was very little, five or six, after a family road trip to California, Mara told her parents she’d decided to grow up to be a billboard painter and paint new billboards every day that would make drivers feel peaceful instead of wanting to honk their horns. She was too young to understand her parents’ amused reaction. A few years later, she announced she would write a book that her parents would edit, though what kind of book remained uncertain since her mother worked on nonfiction and her father edited poetry. A poetic book about pretzel baking, or maybe mountain climbing? That plan, too, drew indulgent smiles. Now, when she closed her eyes and thought about the future, it seemed fuzzy, full of sharp edges and dark holes and no colors at all. Was this only since her father had left? She couldn’t remember.
Vic turned off the faucet as their mother murmured.
“What?” Vic turned.
“Oh. Oh, nothing. He just takes himself too seriously, your father.” She cleared her throat. “Do you see him much?” Her voice was affected. She was trying to pretend the question was casual.
“Mom,” said Vic, “I don’t want to talk about Dad, or you and Dad. If I get involved, I’m going to end up having to pay two hundred bucks a week for three years of therapy. As a dancer, I can’t afford it.”
Their mother waved her hand, her eyes still closed. The gesture was unclear: Did she accept Vic’s refusal, or was she waiting for a chance to ask again? Vic seemed concentrated on cutting the ends off the strawberries, and for a few minutes the only sound was the brush pulling through their mother’s hair.
“Don’t hold close to anything, girls,” their mother said at last. “That’s my best piece of maternal advice. Don’t count on anything because everything changes and that’s all you can count on.”
Mara looked up from her mother’s hair to exchange a glance with Vic. When their mom began talking to them like that, making pronouncements and saying “girls,” it meant nothing good. It meant she was feeling morose. That had been true even before their dad had moved out.
“Isn’t that kind of a cliché, Mom?” Mara said, not unkindly. In fact, she sounded like her mother herself, who used to point out clichés when looking over Vic’s or Mara’s school papers. Their mother ignored her.
“Some changes are for the best. Sure, they are,” their mother said. “Learning how to make rice pudding. Consummating my relationship with your father. Earning more money. Those were good changes.”
Vic grabbed a dishtowel, held it under the colander, and brought the strawberries to the table. “Eat,” she said to Mara.
“But the rest—well, the bottom line is, cling to nothing. Even when I was your age, Vic, and I could feel men watching me as I walked down the street, and even