“Sam, you and I have a lot to talk about.” Abigail glances over at him in the passenger seat. “A lot. So the two of us are going to go out for some tacos—they have a taqueria by the hotel that you’re going to love—and do some catching up.” She glances back at Mom and me. “And I’m sure Gillian and—and your grandma—” she says, but the words seem to stick in her throat, “will be fine making their own dinner plans for tonight. Okay?”

The airport’s not far from the downtown, and soon we’re off the expressway and on city streets. It feels like another country here—people outside in summer-weather clothes, strolling, relaxed. Holidaymakers. Mom has rolled down the window and the Florida night air drifts through the car, warm even in the evening.

The hotel is low-budget and nondescript, the lobby a large rectangle with a bar at one end. We wait at reception under yellowish lights and I look around at our little group: my sister, beautiful, tired, angry; my mother, looking out of place in this slightly shabby environment and trying not to show just how out of place she feels in her whole life right now. And Sam, staying close to his mother but keeping a distance still, like a tiny force-field: the distance of not yet forgiven.

Mom and I get our key cards—we’re in a double queen down the hall from Abigail’s room. Meanwhile they’ve put a folding cot in my sister’s room for Sam. We part ways outside the elevator.

“I’ll text you later, okay?” Abigail says, directing her gaze at me rather than Mom. There’s so much to say, so much to unpack. I just nod.

“Talk soon.”

Once inside our room, Mom opens the windows and we hang up the few items of clothing we’ve brought with us. I take out my phone and turn it off airplane mode. A text from Oliver pops up, checking in, and then another alert: Missed call from Dennis. Two missed calls from Dennis. My stomach churns, and I quickly check for voicemails.

None.

I think about calling him back, but then I reason he’s probably spoken to Abigail by now. This is up to the two of them.

“She hates me,” Mom says abruptly, and I look over to where she’s standing by the window.

“It’s been bad between us before,” Mom goes on, gazing out. “But not like this. She’s always had plenty to say to me before. Now she has nothing to say at all.”

I look at her.

“Maybe she’s waiting for what you have to say.”

Mom swallows, moves her gaze from the window and onto me.

“I’m not hungry, Gillian. Are you?”

I shake my head. I should be, but the day we’ve had seems to have destroyed whatever appetite I might have had.