Then there was the time she was pregnant, and just got in the car and drove away—all the way to Big Sur, without telling anyone. In that case, though, she at least picked up the phone after getting there. It was my dad she called, not Dennis, which to be honest wasn’t surprising. That’s the way it always was, with Abigail and my dad. She said later she didn’t know exactly why she’d done it, she’d just felt so restless and agitated. I guess everyone was all too willing to put it down to pregnancy hormones at the time. Abigail was about to become a mother, after all. We all wanted to buy into the narrative that my sister had changed, calmed, settled into herself at last.

And I guess for ten years we got to keep believing it.

*

I’m still in the kitchen, feeling dazed and a little day-drunk, when Oliver gets home. He takes one look at my face and sits down, eyeing the empty bottle of prosecco uncertainly.

“Did Dinah leave?”

I nod.

“Gillian…it’s going to be okay, you know.”

He’s talking about the not-pregnancy. Which, yes, is probably still where most of my mind is at the moment, but now there’s something new to worry about. I tell Oliver about Abigail and his eyebrows shoot up.

“But where does she ‘need’ to be?” he says. “What’s that all about?”

I shrug: search me.

The doorbell rings then, and Oliver goes into the hall—the frosted glass panel is useful like that—and comes back to warn me.

“It’s your mother,” he says.

Oliver and my mom don’t not get along. He just, shall we say, prefers her company at some times more than others, and I think the day we’re having would definitely fall into the category of “others.”

I stand up. “I’ll get it.”

Mom’s standing on the doorstep with an agitated look on her face.

Mom’s one of those very put-together older women. She’s let her natural grey come in but she still gets highlights to create streaks of silver and ash, her hair sitting in an ultra-sleek bob just grazing her ears. She doesn’t like to leave the house without lipstick—daytime lipstick of course, because “red before 6 would be gauche”—and I don’t think I’ve ever once seen the woman in a pair of sneakers, and I probably never will.

“Mom…”

I hold the door as she strides in and follow her through to the kitchen, where I see Oliver has removed the prosecco evidence. I hadn’t told Mom about the positive pregnancy test, and now I’m glad I didn’t.

“Gloria.” Oliver nods, gives her a smile I know well—the polite one, not the warm one.

“Hello, Oliver.” Mom sinks down into one of the kitchen chairs. “Gillian has filled you in, I suppose?”