The waitress brought out rolls and apple butter followed by bowls of whipped potatoes, sauerkraut, canned string beans, applesauce, cabbage, pickled beets with red eggs, and plates of meat loaf, pork, and ham. None of us touched the beets or eggs, but we ate everything else until we were full up.

Next to us, Marie struck up a conversation with the people from Delaware. One of them had a granddaughter starting college in Kutztown where Marie had classmates also going. She talked to them, her face animated and polite. I knew by now that they saw her beneath the makeup, her intelligence and her interest in people. I wished I could talk to her before she left, tell her what Sage had done, how afraid I was for her to leave us.

Dessert was shoofly pie with bowls of vanilla ice cream. Marie’s had a lit candle, and we sang “Happy Birthday.” Everyone around us clapped. It was strange to have an audience. Thomas pushed a small, thin package wrapped in a brown Acme bag and masking tape toward Marie.

“Here.”

Marie opened it and pulled out a single. “‘Kill the Poor.’ I’ve wanted this all year. Dead Kennedys.”

Thomas looked utterly delighted with himself, particularly for the effect on the Delaware couples, who were visibly appalled.

“How’d you get it?” Marie asked.

“Jack helped me,” Thomas said. The shoofly crust stuck in my throat, and I had to force myself to swallow. I didn’t think Jack and Thomas talked anymore. “I gave him the money, and he got it in Philly for me. I know you’re about to start working in a record store, but . . .”

“I’ll be broke and working in a record store. Thanks.”

Mom’s gift was a square box, perfectly wrapped with ribbons. Inside was an electric clock with an alarm, “So you can wake up on time in your new life,” she said. My gift was wrapped in black tissue paper I’d taken from a shoe box. I’d gotten Marie fifteen punk pin badges—Ramones, Sex Pistols, The Stranglers, The Clash, Devo. Rae had helped me get them from people at her art college and from shows she went to. Ellen had done a pencil sketch of Marie, just her face, that she had rolled up and tied with a ribbon.

“Oh, that’s incredible,” said the woman next to Marie. “Just like you.” No one could believe Ellen had done it, and my mom held it for a long time.

“There’s mine still,” said Beatrice. She got Marie a Ziggy mug. “It’s for when you have coffee in your new apartment.”