“We’re not tw—” Maya and I both said, then stopped and looked at each other, frowning. We probably weren’t twin sisters, but we didn’t really know for sure. We might be. Or maybe she was just my clone. Actually, what’s the difference? I needed to do a little research.

“I can tell all of you are mad at each other,” Angel said, stepping to the middle of the aisle. “But I don’t know why.” She looked at all of us. “Is this what you want to do right now? I mean, Max and Fang each have their own flocks. Fang, you chose to leave, so you can’t really argue with anything Max is doing now. If you wanted to have an opinion about it, you should have said something before you left.”

I was surprised to hear Angel say that, and Fang looked stunned.

“She doesn’t have to—” Fang started, but Angel held up her hand, with a stern, no-nonsense look that only a seven-year-old could pull off.

“Max can do what she wants,” Angel said. “You can either stay and weigh in, or you can leave and have no say. That’s how it works.”

Fang opened his mouth, then closed it, looking like he rued the day Angel learned to speak. He threw himself down in a chair, not looking at her, waves of heated anger almost visible.

I was in shock too. Angel had said things that I had felt but had been unable to put into words. She was summing up everything that was making me mad and expressing it so much better than I could have. I hadn’t gotten much further than “Me mad.”

“And Max,” Angel said, turning to me, “you’re the flock leader. Frankly, you need to do better than this.”

I blinked.

“You’re the flock leader when Fang is there, and you’re the flock leader when Fang is gone. I know you’ll always love Fang, but you shouldn’t let him—or Maya—get to you like this. And you shouldn’t let Dylan’s feelings toss you around like a little boat without a sail. You’re a big boat, Max. You have to act like it.”

“I’m a… big boat?” I asked. She’d lost me back at “Maya.”

“Yes,” she said patiently. “You are. You’re the leader, but you’re acting like everyone else’s feelings are more important than your own. Your feelings should be the most important feelings to you.”

“I have to think about what other people feel,” I protested. Especially since I’d been criticized in the past for not caring about other people’s feelings!