“Nate?”
“Yeah?”
“I think that’s more data than I can handle right now.”
He nods. “Right. Sorry. Let’s do a puzzle.”
We do most of a puzzle. One of those color gradation ones that are really hard.
It doesn’t help.
* * *
It’s dark when they get back.
“Sit on the couch, Hannah,” Uncle Tony says.
His tone—I’ve never heard him angry. But he is now.
She storms past me and throws herself onto the love seat, arms crossed. A hospital bracelet circles her wrist, and there are dark smudges under her eyes.
Aunt Nora follows Uncle Tony into the living room, looking equally exhausted. Nate starts to stand.
“Do you want me to head out?”
“No,” she says. “This is a family discussion.”
“I don’t see how it’s any of their business,” Nah says, glaring at me, then at Nate.
Uncle Tony spreads his hands. “Kid, when you put everyone around you through hell, it’s their business.”
“I didn’t ask to move here, to live with you. If I’m too much of a burden—”
“That’s not what I’m saying,” Uncle Tony growls. “You’re not a burden, you’re my niece, and I want you to have a good, long life.”
For just a second, a look of remorse covers her face.
We are so lucky. What if we hadn’t had relatives like them to take us in? Parents who could leave us money? What if we’d been poor, with horrible, abusive kin? What if they’d released us to the state, like my bio mom did?
So strange, to know we are the lucky ones.
“Everyone in this room loves you,” Aunt Nora says. “And we’ve been worried sick about you.” She fidgets with the little buttons on her blouse, and I catch her fingers shaking. “I should have seen what was happening. I thought it was depression.”
“It’s my fault,” I say.
“No,” Aunt Nora says, firm. “It’s a disease. Annie’s cancer was a disease, and it wasn’t our fault or hers. Your sister’s addiction isn’t her fault—that’s genes and bad luck and evil pharmaceutical companies the government isn’t regulating. This is one equation you are not a part of, Mae.”
I shake my head. “I should have told. It didn’t have to get to this point. I tried to fix things on my own—”
“Any other betrayals you want to add to the list, Mae?” Nah says. Sneers. She actually sneers. I hate her drugs, and I hate how she is when she’s on them, but I hate even more how she is when she’s not on them but wants to be.
“Just to myself,” I say.
I am tired of being seen as her enemy. And failing. Every day I fail with her, and I don’t know how to deal with failure.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” she says.
I look at her, Nate, my aunt and uncle. “I cancelled my Annapolis interview. I lied to all of you and said I did it, but it never happened. I’m staying here.”
“What. The. Fuck.” Nate’s staring at me. “Are you kidding me right now? That’s your future. You’ve worked your whole life for this!”
I keep my eyes on my sister. “You think I see you as some math problem I can fix. But I don’t. You’re my sister. And I love you.” I am leaning so far forward on my chair that I’m almost on my knees. Begging. “And I’m scared. So I decided to stay so that we could beat this thing. Together.”
Her skin goes blotchy. “I don’t want that. Call them back, Mae. I didn’t ask for that!”
“If you had cancer, like Annie did, I’d stay. This is the same thing. Like Aunt Nora said, you have a disease. You’re sick. And if we don’t treat it, you could die. Or at least have a really awful life.”
“You are making too big a deal of this!” Hannah says. “Seriously. Like, I’m sorry I didn’t come home one night—ground me or whatever. I don’t need this, like, this fucking intervention, and I don’t need you to give up your dreams, and this is so stupid, it’s just so—”
Aunt Nora stands. “This isn’t about last night. It’s about all the weeks before that.”
“But we’ll start with last night,” Uncle Tony says. He shoves his hands in his pockets. “You didn’t even call, Hannah. Your sister’s birthday, the first without your parents. We couldn’t believe it. Thought something terrible had to have happened for you to pull something like that. Didn’t want to worry Mae because she was already so upset about your dad, so we tried to handle it on our own. Your phone was off. I was getting ready to call the cops this morning, but then Mae told us about the pills. We were terrified. You were out in a snowstorm, on drugs. And then, considering who you were with—”
Nah throws a look of pure hatred toward the chairs Nate and I sit in by the fireplace. “You don’t know Drew at all. You’re just judging him because he’s not like you, all brilliant and—”
“We’re judging him because he sold you drugs, Hannah,” Nate says.
“Not in forever!”
Nate rolls his eyes. “Forever? Considering you’ve known him for about a month, that means he sold you some, what, last week?”
“Fuck you.”
“Hey.” Aunt Nora glares at Nah. “There’s no excuse for that. Your cousin loves you. That’s why he’s here. I’m sure there are a lot more things Nate would rather be doing.”
“Then he should go do them,” she snaps.
Who is this girl? Where is my sister, who rubbed Mom’s lotion into my hands when I was sad?
Aunt Nora seems to read my mind.
“She’s in withdrawal. They said she’d be … irritable. Among other things.”
Nah gives an inarticulate growl. “I don’t appreciate being talked about like I’m not here.”
“And none of us appreciate being talked to like we’re the enemy,” Aunt Nora says. “We have to make some decisions about next steps. All of us.”
She looks around, and I swear we’re suddenly in a courtroom and she’s about to give one of her opening statements. She’s decided Hannah is guilty, and now there will be consequences.
“What are her options?” Nate asks.
“They want me to go to fucking rehab,” Nah says. “Just because I came home one time on something—”
“It wasn’t just one time,” Uncle Tony says. “You already admitted that at the hospital. You’ve relapsed, and we have to—”
“Let’s see both of your parents die in a tsunami and see how you cope, Tony,” she says.
He gives her a hard stare. “Let’s see you watch your daughter die of leukemia and see how you cope.”
All of us flinch—Nah included.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers.
“Do you see what this shit turns you into?” Uncle Tony says. “Do you know how lucky you are to be alive?”
“Tony.” Aunt Nora gives a slight shake of her head, and he stands and crosses to the far side of the room, stares out the window. His hands are shaking. He’s not mad, I realize: He’s scared.