Hank was taking a nap later that day when the crow caught my attention by muttering his disapproval, which meant my mom was at the door. He was perched on the windowsill with his cat, watching the brown birds foraging for crumbs on the porch.

The cat was happy though, standing and stretching in preparation of acting a fool. He meowed loudly as he jumped down to stand at the door and scratch. He had questionable taste. 

My mother knocked lightly and I rolled my eyes but opened the door. "Hi. Hank's sleeping."

She stood there with her gray hair and hound dog eyes and twisted the handles of the pink handbag from Ross she held. I remembered her familiar smell when she would hug me after a nightmare, the most comforting person in my world. Until, of course, I'd found out what nightmares truly were, and by then she was only a void.

The cat knew nothing about this and twined around her ankles, vocalizing his pleasure. "Hi, honey, I don't have to stay and bother you, I know you're probably busy." 

But she wanted to, was the thing, and I knew it, and she knew I knew it, and fuck. "You can come in," I said less than graciously. "He'll be up soon." I stepped back so she could enter, and allowed her to hug me while I returned it stiffly. "Make yourself at home." I gestured toward the living room.

She smiled and stepped around PK, who stood on his hind legs to paw at her until she patted his head. "There's a good kitty," she told him, then continued on her way to the couch. We'd never had animals, for a number of reasons. There wasn't enough money to feed ourselves properly half the time, let alone pets, and my dad didn't like animals. 

The crow flew abruptly down to land in front of the door and slip out before it closed. He didn't care for her, undoubtedly picking up on my vibes. I opened the door again as I heard Leif parking. 

He breezed through the door and tossed his jacket toward the coat tree, messed up my hair, and rolled his eyes toward the living room. "I see we have company," he said dryly. He liked my mother about as much as the bird did.

"Shh," I admonished him. I made him be nice because that was easiest. They'd had a huge fight about six months after she'd returned. Or rather, he'd yelled at her for five minutes about leaving and not being here for me and started running down a list of the things that had happened since then that he considered mostly her fault. I'd finally stopped him and she'd cried and apologized over and over, and it wasn't one of my favorite nights to remember.

"Well, the banquet sucked, but the tips from the old biddies were nice, and I got a plate of food at the end. Sausage and bacon and eggs, poached of course. And those little square potatoes that have the green onions in them that you always pick out, what are they called, something Irish." He gestured as he took his fancy boy shoes off.

"O'brien," I supplied, going back into the kitchen.

He trailed me, slurping from my coffee cup and yanking open the fridge to peer inside.

"You just ate," I reminded him, unloading the dishwasher. I knew I should go in and make conversation with my mom, but I didn't want to.

"That was like an hour ago." He pulled out the spicy bean dip and went rooting in the cupboard for the Fritos Scoops. 

"At least put some on a plate," I implored.

"Yeah, probably not gonna do that," he said, his hand already in the bag. Next he peeled off the lid of the little can and dipped a chip in. He popped it into his mouth and made another one, holding it out. I shook my head. "I stopped by Caleb's and finally met Courtney." At least he tried to keep the appreciative look off his face.

I braced myself for the report as I put the cups on their shelf. "And?"

"And one thing you can say about my brother, he has impeccable taste in women," he answered with a smirk. The bruise on his neck was darkening. "She actually looks like you, now that I think about it. We'll have to keep her away from Rapunzel." 

"Shut up," I said, a little glad she looked like me, if that were true.

"Except her boobs," he reconsidered, cupping his hands in front of his own chest. "Not to be a pig, but damn."

I just shook my head and finished putting away the silverware, then made myself go into the other room. "You want something to eat, Mom?"

She sat on one side of the couch somewhat awkwardly, perched on the edge of the cushion and still clutching her bag. The cat lay next to her, doing happy feet on her leg. "I'm fine, I had a sausage McMuffin a little while ago. They come with the little hashbrown and a coffee, which is pretty good if you put some cream and two sugars in it. Thank you though." Her eyes shifted to look over my shoulder and she winced a little, though it may have been due to the claws in her thigh. "Hello, Leif."

He sighed audibly. "Hello, Miriam," he said flatly, standing by me with the dip container in one hand and a bowl of chips in the other. I elbowed him. "How are you," he added with a tad more warmth. 

"Not too bad," she said automatically, swallowing. "And yourself?"

"Oh, I'm just dandy." He put too many chips in his mouth and chewed belligerently. I flashed on him ranting at her that one night.

"Mary almost died too!" he'd shouted with his finger in her face even as I'd pulled him backward, using my name intentionally. "It's impossible that she's even alive, don't you get that? And all she wanted was you and Elle, and both of you were gone, and she cried for you guys every fucking night in the hospital after she woke up in a field of torn-apart bodies! She woke up with her sister DEAD next to her and then they cut off her fucking finger and Elle couldn't help being gone but you! YOU could have been there! You should have BEEN THERE because she needed you, goddammit!" 

Halley and I had calmed him down and she had groveled with apologies, and he seemed to feel better afterward. At least it made it easier for him to be civil to her, having gotten it off his chest.

"I just came to get Hazel's things she wanted," she explained nervously to him now. The cat was watching her face and he meowed, turning upside down so she would scratch his stomach. "Her hair straightener, I know she mentioned. I'll pick her up some cigarettes at the corner store." 

I sat in my spot and turned the TV to a flip-this-house show, which she liked, leaving the volume low. "Yeah, I'll get it in a minute. Halley will be home with Jasper soon if you want to see him." I tried not to sound grudging. Therapy helped, both family and personal. I even made Leif come sometimes, over his vehement protests. 

I wished Halley was home already. I thought of the shower we'd shared earlier that morning and had to bite back a smile. All soft and sudsy and slippery and--

"That would be nice," my mom said too eagerly, bringing me out of my lovely reverie. She doted upon the kids, which was good for them, though I couldn't help but worry she would disappear suddenly again, leaving them with another absent loved one.

"What the hell does Hazel need to be doing her hair for in rehab," Leif mused, narrowing his eyes. "She better not be hooking up with someone."

I stole some of his chips. "Hopefully not another heroin addict."

My mother made a tsk sound. "Now, honey, your sister's not a heroin addict, don't even say that." She laughed uneasily and the cat grabbed her hand and bit her thumb playfully.

Maybe, maybe not. "I like it too much," Hazel had confessed dopily to me that night she'd hit the cop car, after her latest boyfriend had bailed her out. She'd had him drop her off at home, even though she had her own apartment in Caleb's building that I paid good money for. "It makes me feel so relaxed, Mary, you have no idea. I don't even want to stop."

My mother was worried. "She said she only used it for fun," she protested.

Leif couldn't keep quiet any longer. "Yeah, Tug, what's the big deal? I mean, it was just some recreational heroin. Gosh."

We grinned at each other.

Mom continued to fret. "A person can't get addicted that quickly, can they?" she pushed, looking to me for reassurance. "Do you think that can really happen?"

Now the glance I exchanged with Leif was more somber. One painful truth I'd learned about my mother was that she was of lower-than-average intelligence, something I hadn't been able to see as a child or teen. In a way it helped to discover this, as it made up for a lot of our upbringing due to the simple fact that she hadn't known how to do better and had probably done the best she could.

Add in mental illness and it's a wonder she'd managed as well as she had, if you could look at it objectively. Her parents had died from cancer when I was young, and I barely remembered them, so I didn't know if they were the same way. My father wasn't the brightest bulb in the chandelier but he was clearly smarter than she was. 

It made me wonder where my genius brother Noah had gotten his IQ, not to mention Hazel's kids, who were all highly intelligent. Joey and I were both A students when we applied ourselves, as the teachers had loved to point out. Elle had received high grades effortlessly. Hazel, I wasn't sure about. Maybe her actual problem was literally being too dumb to know how to act right.

Or maybe she was in fact bright enough to pretend she was.

"I think she'll be fine," I assured my mother, which was a lie, but no need for her to know that.

She settled back a little, relieved and nodding. The cat's purr was audible to everyone. "Everyone parties a little, and she's so young. Keeping her away from her children isn't the answer, though." This wasn't directed at me but at the judge.

Leif rolled his eyes, turning the chip he held to get the last of the dip out of the can. "When she can be trusted around them, she can have the privilege of being in their lives more." The like you was implied but left unspoken. 

"They're going to think she abandoned them," she said, her voice small as she studied the idiot cat rolling around in her lap.

He crumpled the chip bag abruptly, startling us all and making PK jump to his feet with wide eyes. "She did abandon them, when she chose to be a shitty mother," he said, avoiding me because he didn't want to see the look I was giving him. Even if he was right.

We heard the baby start calling over the monitor on the table, the red lights filling up at the sound of his little voice. "Annie Hay! Shi-yo! Hank up! Annie May! Dit Hank ooout!"

My mom jumped up and went to get him, accompanied by the meowing feline. 

I eyed my best friend until he met my gaze, albeit saucily. "Relax," I said mildly. 

"I'm relaxed," he said, glancing at the bag in his fist that belied his words. He loosened his fingers, sighing in frustration. "Just, really? Hazel shouldn't have a fucking house plant, let alone children."

I raised my eyebrows. "She doesn't," I reminded him. The cat meowed.

"A fake house plant," he amended, as if he needed to convince me.

As if I didn't agree completely.