Over the next three days, Esme, Liv, Ru, and Atty worked hard at sisterhood.

Liv found an acupuncturist and they went in together and got individual sessions. Liv explained that this would help get their Zen straight and allow them to open up to life and all of its possibilities.

“Like your father orchestrating a big gift?” Esme said.

“Or like in the romance department?” Atty asked, earnestly.

Liv shrugged. “Just go with it.” She missed Mrs. Kwok, though—in one swollen moment—and wanted to thank her for pulling her out of the window during the hurricane.

During her session, Atty tweeted, Living pincushions. Is this really about love? #sisterhood and Feel like one of Nabokov’s butterflies stuck to a corkboard. #sisterhood and, finally, F this sh*t. I’m perforated. #sisterhoodnotworthit

They played a few rounds of Spoons, but Liv and Esme grabbed a spoon simultaneously and even after a bit of wrestling, neither would let it go. They sat on chairs in the kitchen for forty-five minutes until Liv acquiesced. “This is stupid. You win. What’s wrong with you anyway?”

“I win!” Esme said and then she restacked the deck of cards and put the spoons into the dishwasher.

Atty tweeted, Watching grown women revert to middle school hierarchal structures. #uglysisterhood

Early one morning, they pulled old bikes from the shed out back and worked on them for about an hour and a half before realizing that the tires were so rotted they’d never hold air. Sweaty but undeterred, they rented beach bikes and rode them on the boardwalk.

Atty tweeted, I hate old lady exercise. #sisterhood and We’re all wearing yoga pants and no one’s doing yoga. #sisterhood and, finally, If my bike had a basket, I’d shove Toto into it. #sickofsisterhood

They tried to teach Ingmar to climb the stairs with a series of treats and failed. Atty tweeted, The collie clings to land, will never climb the ladder to success. #overratedanyway

They hung out on the third floor, too. Ru found the old record player and put on some Sean Cassidy. Esme sorted through old photographs. Liv taped the best ones to the wall—for some reason, this was a comfort. Atty dug through old boxes, and inside one, wrapped in tissue, she found three wooden items she couldn’t name. “What are these?” She held them like a strange three-stemmed bouquet.

“Conductor’s batons,” Ru said.

“You all took conducting lessons?” Atty asked.

Liv reached out and took one of the batons, lifting it in the air with a familiar ease. “We conducted storms,” she said. “Augusta taught us.”

Esme shook her head. “It was a strange childhood,” she whispered.

“It’s a strange adulthood too,” Ru said.

And then a phone beeped.

“Gotta go check on the flan,” Liv said.

“You’re making flan?” Esme asked.

“It’s a comfort food.”

Over flan, the four of them took the time to devise a plan.

Esme already knew what she wanted from her father—to track down Darwin Webber and apologize—but they’d decided that they each needed to make a request.

“I’m just his granddaughter. Do I need to want something from him?” Atty asked.

“You can go either way,” Esme said.

“I could use a hand looking for Nancy Drews,” Atty said. “I’m missing six of them and I can’t drive.”

“Well, the old man can drive so there. You’ve got yours,” Ru said.

Liv tried to beg off on the grounds that she’d gotten more than she’d expected from the man.

“That’s just material stuff,” Esme reminded her. “You can want something on an emotional level too, you know.”

“I’m not really comfortable with wanting on an emotional level,” Liv said.

“Well, we all have to ask for something,” Ru said, inventing a rule.

“Otherwise, I’ll get pegged as the needy one and that’s not fair,” Esme said.

“What do you want then, Ru?” Liv asked Ru.

“I’m not sure yet, but I know it’ll come to me.”