Mariana gripped the edge of a barstool at the kitchen island. She’d been listening to Nora’s rant long enough, the rant about how Mariana didn’t know enough to insert her opinion about Ellie. That Mariana had no right. “You’re seriously thinking that you should pull your daughter out of school less than a year before she goes to college.”
“What I’m saying,” Nora said, her lips white against her face, “is that you don’t have a say in it.”
Mariana nodded. “I hear you. I should just butt out.”
“Exactly.”
“Yeah, well. I can’t do that.” She straightened her spine, feeling every tiny bit of her half-centimeter height advantage.
Nora laughed, and the sound of it sliced the interior of Mariana’s heart. “You think you get to say what my daughter does or doesn’t do?”
Mariana pulled her lips in.
“Oh, my god,” Nora said. “You do think that.”
“Now? Now is the only time I have!” Nora hit the top of the cutting board with the flat of her hand, a thump followed by a wooden clatter.
Mariana knew she wasn’t handling this right. “Okay, I hear you, we can just—”
“Don’t you dare patronize me.”
Her temper flared. “So you want me to help you with everything else, but not with Ellie.”
There was a long, taut pause. “Yes.”
“Why?”
Nora shook her head, refusing to answer.
Mariana heard what she didn’t say, though. She already knew the answer. Not good enough. Fuckup. Never the right one. “She’s my only niece. You’re my sister.” She bent at the waist, collapsed like a snapped clothesline, and then straightened as if she were being winched back into place.
“One thing.” Nora crossed her arms. “I need you to leave me this one thing.”
“One thing? Fuck, Nora, letting you take care of Ellie isn’t like you wanting to pick up the dry cleaning.”
“You couldn’t even remember the mashed potatoes. Good god, when have I ever been able to count on you? And you want to take my daughter away from me?”
“Of course not—”
There was a cough behind them, in the living room.
Ellie stood there, her thin arms long along her sides, her green eyes as wide as a startled cat’s. “Mom?”
This was terrible. Mariana didn’t know much, but she knew this: she couldn’t go back to the table with Nora and pretend everything was fine.
Nothing was fine.
Her sister was dying.
And she’d never be good enough, not even as a fill-in, second-string substitute.
So she said, “Ellie, darlin’, I have to leave. I forgot . . .” God, it was hot in here. She had to get out. Go home. Find Luke. Look down. Open her hands. Find her breath.
“She forgot what’s important,” said Nora. “That’s all.”
That was too much. “Holy shit. Excuse me?” The only important things in the whole world were Nora and Ellie. Mariana never forgot it, not even in her deepest sleep. Never.
Nora went on. “After all the ways I’ve taken care of you over the years, after all the things I fixed for you, you think you’re ready to take over? To just step into my shoes?”
Mariana swiped at her forehead, which was as wet as if she’d just come in from the rain. “The things you took care of.”
“Do I have to list them?”
“You have a list?”
Nora held up a hand. “Feeding you when Mom was too busy or too tired to. Making sure your homework was done while I did my own.” With every point, she raised a finger. “Moving out. Finding our apartment. Getting us financial aid, for whatever that was worth, since you didn’t even stay until graduation. When you came back from India the first time, I put you up again for three years.”
“Put me up? I thought we lived together. I didn’t know I was considered a charity case.”
“Stop it,” said Ellie.
“You barely remembered to put money toward rent every month.” Nora raised her other hand and with it, more fingers. “Eddie, the goldfish. Timothy, our cat. Antonia, your godchild. Every plant I ever gave you. You’re irresponsible. You have no follow-through. You can’t be trusted with emotions.” She glanced at Ellie, as if she was going to stop, but then she didn’t. “You can’t be trusted with her.”
It felt as though Nora had stabbed her in the gut. It was one thing to wonder. It was another thing altogether to know.
But Nora kept talking, her voice acid. “I don’t know why I thought you could take care of my daughter when I was gone. What the hell was I thinking?”
Did she want Mariana to crumble? To be washed away? To be forced into a free fall, through a space so cold she felt she’d never be warm again? “Nora, stop.” Mariana looked at Ellie, whose face was white as she held on to the doorframe, neither quite in nor quite out of the kitchen.
Nora said, her hand back on the cutting board as if she might smack it again, “You’ve never taken care of one thing except your business, and that’s brand-new. Congratulations on that, by the way. Good thing you have a million listeners who think you’re compassionate. That’ll keep you warm at night. Keep up the good work.”
Behind them, Ellie started crying.
And Mariana knew it was finally time to tell her sister the truth.