Mom’s hands were wrapped around her tea cup and she was staring into the garden. Dad was straddling a chair beside the table. I only caught the end of what he was saying but it didn’t matter. I knew what he was talking about.

“…gone on long enough. Christina and Dimitri don’t deserve this.”

When I glanced at him, he shrugged and shook his head like he was getting nowhere.

For the record, seeing your mom miserable is one of the worst things in the world. Being separated from your almost-twin is another. Knowing it was your fault is a third. And seeing your dad desperately wanting to help but feeling useless is a fourth. All of them together is a pancake stack of bad things.

The phone rang. I was closest to it, so I answered it. I heard Mom mutter, “Whoever it is, I’m not in.”

“Hello?”

“Hi Katerina,” a woman said, not giving me time to correct her. “It’s Biatra Hadjipateras. Can I speak to your mom, please?”

Lots of people had tried to talk sense into Mom since Yiayia died. They’d probably tried it with Aunt Soph as well. I don’t know about Aunt Soph, but Mom wasn’t budging.

“She not in,” I said. Lying because I was told to by my own mother. Which is all kinds of wrong.

“Honey, I know she is. Tell her it’s me.”

I went into the kitchen with the phone and held it out to Mom.

“I told you—I’m not in!” Mom mouthed at me.

I held the phone to my ear. “Mom said she’s not in.”

Biatra laughed. “Put me on loudspeaker so she can hear me.”

So I did.

“I know you’re there,” Biatra said to the whole kitchen but mainly to my mom. “Lina-mou, enough. She’s your sister. Your sister. More important than a necklace. You hear me? Your sister.”

“It’s not about the necklace anymore,” Mom said, suddenly deciding she was in. “Even if she gave it back tomorrow—and I know she’s got it—it wouldn’t make the slightest bit of difference. She’s not my sister. Not anymore.”

I put the phone down, went into the living room, and took out my notebook.

In the quietest times, when it was just me inside my head and no noise—you know, when you go to that place deep inside you where the truth is supposed to be (if the truth really was a thing)—I asked myself this: what was the point of getting in a truckload of trouble when it wouldn’t fix anything anyway?

Still. I couldn’t handle Mom being like this anymore.

So I wrote:

I want:

• to see Mom and Aunt Soph laughing.

• to watch them painting each other’s nails Congealed Pig Blood, Highly Polished Coffee Table, and all the other weird colors they have in their collection.

• them to plan Paska (Easter) together and figure out how to make Pappou interested in fat zucchinis and mini lemons again.

• them to hug and cry and help each other deal with the fact that Yiayia’s gone.

• this to be over and for us all to be a family again.

I put my pen down and wiped my eyes. Dimitri and Christina deserved an extra special wedding with Dimitri’s sisters smiling beside him, and the day was coming toward us like a high-speed train. It was sad enough that Yiayia wasn’t going to be there. Getting married like this was going to be horrible.

And as for marriages, how were Eleni and I going to marry two brothers on the same day and have a big fat Greek wedding with puffy dresses, tables full of loukomades, and bags of koufeta if we weren’t talking and neither were our families?

I closed my notebook and climbed the stairs.

Nicos was in his room. I don’t go in there. It’s a no-go zone. Not because he tells me to keep away or anything, but because, you know. Teenage boy. Thinks he’s cool. Really isn’t. Nicos has weird uneven hair that’s shaved short at the sides and long on top, like the barber ran off halfway through the haircut. And, don’t ask me why, but he gets away with everything because he’s a boy.

His door was half open. I could see him on his bed, holding up one of his hideous new sneakers. He’d designed them online. They were neon yellow, orange, and blue with green stars on them, and they were seriously yuck.

“Look at my new sneakers, Lex. Sick, aren’t they?” he said when he saw me.

I nodded and I wasn’t even lying: they really did look like vomit.

“No one’s got sneakers like these. They’re one hundred percent unique.” Nicos might have said no one but he meant Elias.

“That’s great,” I replied, and I truly meant it. The world did not need more sneakers like those in it. “Maybe you could, you know, phone Elias. To tell him. He’ll like them, for sure.” Meaning, apart from you, he’s the only person in the entire universe who will like them.

Nicos looked up. “What? No!” he said with a frown.

“Why not? Don’t you want to make him jealous?” Nicos and Elias were massive rivals. They were best friends, but they still argued about everything. Now that Nicos didn’t have Elias to compete with about everything from Frisbee throwing to gaming, he was a little lost.

“Because,” he said. “I’m not going against Mom.”

“But if one of us starts talking to one of them, it might get Mom and Aunt Soph talking. And then Mom would be happy again.”

“I’m not going behind her back. And neither are you.”

“But I miss her,” I murmured.

“She’s downstairs. Go say hi.”

“Not Mom,” I said rolling my eyes.

Nicos grinned and then twisted his lips to one side. “Stand firm, sis. This isn’t about you. This is important to Mom. And she needs to know that we’ve got her back. OK?”

I made a face, walked off into my bedroom, and sat down on my bed.

Every time I went in there, the necklace screamed at me from inside my closet like something from a horror movie. Even if it had been at the bottom of a thousand blankets and a million closets, I would have still felt it. It was like the story about the princess with the pea under her mattress (but a scary version of the story with an evil pea that I’d created myself). I’d been so paranoid that Mom would find it, but no one looked in the shoebox with my old birthday cards in it, not even her.

I didn’t want to think about what would happen if she did.