It only takes two blocks for Leo to say it.

“What were you thinking?” he asks, his eyes wide beneath his red woolen cap. “How could you turn down twenty-six million dollars just like that?”

He snaps his fingers and I wince.

I don’t have an answer for him. The enormity of what happened is just beginning to settle over me. My response was quick and automatic, a purely knee-jerk reaction. It’s only now dawning on me that I just politely declined a literal fortune.

“I don’t know,” I say as I breathe into my hands. “I guess I didn’t expect him to spring that on me—”

Leo raises an eyebrow. “Come on,” he says. “You guys found the ticket, like, five hours ago. It must’ve crossed your mind that he’d offer you some of it.”

“It didn’t,” I say truthfully. “It’s his ticket. Not mine.”

“Yeah, but you bought it.”

“As a gift,” I say, exasperated. “Why does nobody get that?”

“Because,” Leo says, looking at me with amusement, “I don’t think anyone else would ever think that way.”

“What do you mean?”

He shrugs. “Most people would be dreaming of all the things they could buy or thinking about how awful the economy is or how they wouldn’t have to worry so much about getting a job one day. Most people would be busy looking out for themselves.”

“And you think I should be too,” I say flatly. “Since I have nobody but myself.”

He turns to me, brow furrowed. “What? No. That’s not what I meant at all.”

“It’s what Teddy was trying to say too. That I need a safety net.” I keep my eyes straight ahead as I say this, unable to look at him. “Because I’m on my own.”

“That’s not true,” Leo says, and though he means it to sound comforting, there’s a hint of annoyance in his voice. “You have me. And my parents. You know that.”

“But it’s not the same as it is for you. I’m eighteen now, which means they’re not technically responsible for me anymore.” I can tell he’s about to interrupt me, so I hurry on. “I know they’ll always be there if I need them—I do. But it still makes me an island.”

Leo comes to a stop, turning to face me. “That’s what you think?”

I shift from one foot to the other. We’re standing in an inch of slush and I can feel my toes growing cold even in my rubber boots.

“You’re not alone.” He looks wounded. “You have us. Forever.”

Forever, I think, closing my eyes for a second.

It seems like such a brittle promise.

“You’ve been here nine years,” he says. “That’s, like, thousands of family dinners. But you still think of San Francisco as home. It’s not that you’re actually an island, Alice. It’s just that you still act like one. And nobody can change that but you.”

I dip my chin, staring down at my boots, then blow out a puff of frozen air. The words have a sting to them, and I realize that’s because they’re true.

“I know,” I say in a small voice, and Leo gives me an officious nod, like this is all he wanted to hear. Then he begins to walk again, picking his way around the puddles.

“Besides,” he says over his shoulder, “if anything, you’re more of a peninsula.”

“Like Florida?” I ask, which makes him laugh.

“Something like that.”

We walk in silence for another block, our heads bent against the wind, and when we pause at an intersection I glance over at him. “Teddy wasn’t totally wrong,” I admit. “If I was smart, I probably would’ve taken the money. But it doesn’t feel like mine to take.”

“Yeah, but—”

“The ticket belongs to him,” I say. “Which means the money belongs to him. That’s all there is to it.”

“Right, but—”

“Leo,” I say with a sigh. “It was the right thing to do, okay?”

He gives me a look I know well. The one that suggests I’m not telling him everything. When the light turns green, we make our way across the icy crosswalk. Leo’s jaw is set and his hands are shoved into his pockets, and even though it might look for all the world like he’s lost in thought or simply ignoring me, I can tell he’s really just biding his time, waiting for me to admit the true reason.

“Fine,” I say eventually. “Maybe I’m a little afraid of it too.”

“Why?”

“Because,” I say with a shrug, “you heard what Teddy said. It’s the kind of money that could change everything.”

“Ah,” he says, a look of understanding passing over his face.

“Everything in my life has already changed once before,” I tell him, trying to sound matter-of-fact. “And I don’t really have any interest in that happening again.”

This time when Leo stops and turns to me, his brown eyes are clear and bright. “I get it,” he says. “Your parents died, and your life got turned upside down, and now all you want is for things to be normal.”

I blink at him. “I guess.”

“And you got a bunch of money out of it too,” he continues. “Which you’d trade in a heartbeat for more time with them. Right?”

“Right,” I say cautiously, not sure where this is going.

“So now the last thing you’d ever want is more money,” he says, like he’s just solved some sort of mystery. “Especially a lot more money.”

“Leo,” I say with a frown. “Stop trying to psychoanalyze me.”

He laughs. “I’m just trying to figure out where you’re coming from,” he says as we start to walk again. “I do get it. At least somewhat. But I still think you’re nuts for turning down the money.”

I shrug. “Maybe I am. But it just feels like…I don’t know. It’s almost too much, isn’t it? I mean, I’m so happy for Teddy, and for Katherine, because I know they really need it. But if you had the choice, would you honestly want millions and millions of dollars, just like that, out of nowhere?”

“Yes,” Leo says, so emphatically that we both laugh. “I think if you asked a hundred people that question, they’d all say the same thing. They’d also fully expect to split the ticket, by the way. Which would be totally fair.”

“Isn’t it enough just to be excited for Teddy?”

“Maybe,” he says, softening. “But the universe owes you the same way it does him. Probably a lot more.”

I shake my head. “That’s not how it works.”

“You only think that,” he says, watching me intently, “because you’ve never had any faith in the world. Which makes sense, since it’s let you down in some really horrible ways. But what if this money was supposed to make it up to you? What if it was supposed to balance things out?”

“Leo,” I say, frustrated again. “Come on. You know there’s not enough money in the world for that. And besides, not everything happens for a reason. There’s no grand plan here. All I did was buy a ticket. And it wasn’t even for me. The whole thing was a complete coincidence.”

“Right,” he says insistently, “but it happened. So now you’d be crazy to miss out, especially just because you’re being stubborn.”

“I’m not being stubborn.”

He grins. “She says stubbornly.”

“Leo,” I say with a groan. “Enough.”

“Fine,” he says, holding up his hands. “If this is what you really want…then I guess I can live with it.”

“Thanks,” I say, shaking my head as the pizza place comes into sight, the awning weighed down by snow and the window foggy with steam. “That’s really big of you.”

“It would’ve been fun, though, you know?” he says as he hops up the steps to the entrance. “All those piles of money. Caribbean vacations on private jets. Skyboxes at Wrigley Field. Fancy cars. A stupidly big yacht. Our very own camel.”

I laugh, thinking about Teddy’s theory that I’d want an ostrich.

“I feel like that’s a thing, right?” Leo says. “Rich people all have weird pets.”

“Uncle Jake won’t even let you get a dog.”

He shrugs as he pulls open the door. “That’s because he’s allergic. I’m sure he’d be thrilled with a camel. It’d save him from having to mow the lawn.”

Leo stands there waiting for me to walk inside, but I’ve stopped short, suddenly deep in thought. Because the minute I said Uncle Jake’s name, the realization came crashing over me: that less than an hour ago I was offered millions of dollars, and in my rush to turn it down, I somehow forgot to consider the two people who had welcomed me into their home all those years ago with no expectations whatsoever.

Leo is frowning at me. “Are you coming?”

From inside the restaurant there’s a blast of warm air and the scent of garlic. But I hesitate, suddenly panicky. “Actually, I’m gonna run next door and get some gum.”

He shrugs. “Sure.”

“Want anything?”

“Yeah,” he says, cracking a smile. “How about a lottery ticket?”

I give him a withering look. “Funny.”

But as I walk to the convenience store at the end of the block, my stomach is churning. I try to remember what Aunt Sofia’s face looked like after I refused the money, whether Uncle Jake seemed angry with me. After nine whole years of supporting me, of breakfasts and lunches and dinners, beach vacations and summer camp, ski trips and school fees, doctor visits and phone bills, books and computers and music—all those things that make up a life, all of which come at a price—how could they not be interested in a portion of that money? And how did it not occur to me to ask them?

Leo was clearly right. If I’m an island, there’s no one to blame but myself.

My aunt and uncle have always done everything they can to make me feel like part of their family. But as much as I try, it’s never been easy for me to completely let them in. In my experience families are fragile things. And being part of something—really part of it—means it can be taken away. It means you have something to lose. And I’ve already lost way too much.

Maybe it’s true that I’m more of a peninsula now—attached but apart, connected but separate—but that can be a lonely business too. And I want more than that. I want to be absorbed into their little continent. I want to stop thinking that the worst could happen if I am. I want to be more daughter than niece.

I want to belong.

But that means trying harder. It means letting them in and including them when it comes to the big stuff—like turning down tens of millions of dollars. And maybe the fact that I didn’t is a sign. Maybe it means I’m even further adrift than I thought.

Once, not long after I arrived in Chicago, I heard Leo ask his mom if I was an orphan. They were reading Harry Potter before bed, as they did every night. Aunt Sofia had offered to start again from the beginning so that I could follow along too, but I told her I thought the books were stupid—even though the truth was that I’d already read the first three with my dad and just couldn’t imagine returning to those pages without him.

“Harry’s parents died,” Leo was saying that night as I passed by his room on my way to brush my teeth, “and that made him an orphan, so…”

“Yes,” Aunt Sofia said, her voice brisk. “But it’s different, because Alice has us.”

“Harry had an aunt and uncle,” Leo reminded her. “But they didn’t want him.”

“Well, we want Alice,” she said. “Very, very much.”

“So she’s not an orphan, then?”

There was a short pause, then Aunt Sofia cleared her throat. “Tell me this,” she said. “When you think of Harry, what’s the first word that comes to mind?”

Leo’s answer arrived right away: “Wizard.”

“Exactly. So he’s an orphan and a wizard. Both things are true, right?”

“Right.”

“Well, that’s how it is for all of us. We have all sorts of words that could describe us. But we get to choose which ones are most important.”

Leo paused to consider this. “So Alice could be a wizard too?”

“I suppose it’s possible,” Aunt Sofia said, laughing softly. “But maybe it’ll be something else entirely, some other word we don’t know about just yet.”

“Like what?”

“That,” she said, “is up to Alice.”