Sami sat on the front steps with her chin in her hands and watched her big brother shoot hoops.

Overhead, the sky was a dazzling, watercolor blue, crisscrossed with squawking parrots, palm fronds, and golden hibiscus flowers. It was just as weird here, she sometimes thought, as in her dreams. Before they’d moved, she’d never imagined a place like Coconut Shores even existed. She was used to cold lakes and old mountains and fireplaces. They’d been here nearly a year, and while she could see how pretty Florida was, she often thought she couldn’t feel it. Not deep down. And why should she? Whenever her mom put on the news, it was all about global warming and how Florida was about to be underwater. Or pollution and toxic algae. Or deadly mosquitoes, or people on drugs. Every day things just seemed to get worse and worse—lately, she’d had the feeling that the whole world was getting out of balance, somehow. But no one wanted to see it. People acted like all that mattered was the blue sky and the beach.

Tony had waved to her when she came out, but kept dribbling, his hair spiky with sweat—six days past Thanksgiving and still eighty degrees out. Sami pulled her knees up and rested her chin on top of them, eternally grateful that her brother didn’t mind having a kid sister. He had a big, easy smile and a good loose laugh, and there had seemed to be a crowd of teenagers over at the house practically the second they moved in. Sami still didn’t have any real friend-friends here. Not like Tony. Instead, she sent texts to her old friends in Ithaca, about the dumb Coconut Shores girls who only cared about their tans and makeup.

“Hey, kiddo.” Tony came over, rubbing the back of his neck with a towel. He was just three years older than Sami and it used to be funny when he called her that. Lately, though, it kind of bothered her. “You okay?”

Sami lowered her face, annoyed. She’d never learned how to control her own facial expressions very well. You must learn how to put on your veil, her grandmother had said, fanning out a hand over her mouth and nose like a belly dancer. “When you need to.”

“Aunt Ivory was bugging Teta again.” She handed a thermos of clinking ice water to her brother.

“Hey! Thanks.” He gulped it down, then ran the length of his forearm across his brow.

“I’ll never get why Mom moved us three blocks away from her. She doesn’t even like Aunt Ivory that much; it’s totally obvious,” Sami groused.

Tony sat next to her on the cement steps. He shrugged. “Ivory’s family, Sami. You can’t take things so seriously—you’ll go nuts.”

“I’ve already gone.”

Tony grinned. “Your words, my friend, your words.”

“So, guess what? You know how Ivory’s been wanting to stick Teta in a nursing home? Well, Mom was going on about it just now like she’s starting to have the same idea. It was horrible. I wouldn’t let her even talk about it.”

Tony’s eyebrows rose. Their mother was a defense attorney, famous in their family for never backing off in an argument. “How’d you stop her? From talking about it, I mean.”

Sami took a sip from her own thermos. “I basically ran out.”

He nodded heavily. “That works, I guess. It’s not like she isn’t going to keep talking about it nonstop, anyway.”

Sami sighed, her face against her knees. Then she looked at Tony, frowning. “So, wait—Mom already talked to you about it? About Teta?”

Tony jerked and turned away. “Uh…”

“And…you didn’t say anything to me?” She frowned at her brother. “Whoa. Hold on. She’s already decided, hasn’t she? She just wanted to ‘talk’ so she could tell me what’s going to happen. That’s it, isn’t it? Why didn’t you warn me?”

“Jeez, Sam.” Tony glanced at the basketball. There was a deep V between his eyebrows. “Sometimes there’s just no way to talk to you about stuff—you figure things out before I even know what I want to say.”

“But this is Teta we’re talking about! It’s not like Tumble.”

A few weeks after their mother had put the house on the market, Sami and Tony came home to discover that not only were they moving to Florida, but their mother had given their dog away. She’d done it without saying a word beforehand. “He’d be miserable down there in that heat—all that fur,” Alia had pleaded. “And it’s just too much—to try to move an old dog like that. It isn’t fair to Tumble.”

“What about to us?” Sami had cried, tears streaking her face. It was one of the few times in her life Alia had done something huge that Sami hadn’t been able to sense coming. She’d never imagined such a thing. As bad as the move was, losing their dog was even worse.

Now Tony’s face turned red. He was still upset about it, Sami knew. “Sami, I know this isn’t like Tumble.” His voice was stiff and strange—a deep sort of grown-uppy voice he’d started to have lately. Sometimes he almost sounded like a sad version of their father—at least of how Sami remembered him sounding. “But did you ever consider that—well, what if Mom and Aunt Ivory are actually right? I mean, Teta doesn’t even make sense anymore—she’s not acting normally—no matter what you say. Maybe it’s not really that important how you feel about it. Believe it or not, maybe this is more about what’s best for Teta.”

Sami stood up then. Even though Tony was nearly a foot taller than her, she glared into his eyes, anger making her whole body hot. “She doesn’t have dementia now, Tony. But if we stick her in one of those places, she really will get messed up.”

Tony shook his head. “This isn’t like one of Teta’s fairy stories. I know you think you can get inside her brain and see her hiding in there—or something. But you can’t. That isn’t the way this stuff works, Sami. She needs professional care and stuff. Doctors. Not make-believe.”

Sami pulled back. She’d never before heard Tony make fun of Teta’s stories—real or not. She glared at him for a second before she said in a low voice, “You’re not one of the grown-ups, Tony. Not yet, anyway. And I wish you’d quit trying to be. I wish you’d just—like—be a kid again. Or my brother. The way you used to be!”

Tony shook his head and dribbled toward the basketball hoop, saying as he went, “Yeah, and I wish you’d try growing up.”