Hanadi at four is too big to be picked up like a baby, but she lets her aunt hold her. She is in jean shorts and a white tank top embroidered with red and orange flowers. Her chubby bare legs hang down Lujayn’s thigh.

“I love you, Baba,” she says over her aunt’s shoulder. It’s the first time she’s seen him in two months. Her smile is sunshine falling on the frozen adult landscape around her. “Mama wasn’t in the bathroom.”

“I know, love,” he says.

Saeedah feels her jealousy in every fiber of her body, and she doesn’t want to cure it with a prayer for forgiveness. Hanadi smiles adorably at her father and aunt, and subjects Saeedah to tantrums over the smallest things. The food Saeedah puts on Hanadi’s plate, how long they stay at the ice-skating rink or at the shopping mall play area. Why should Muneer and Lujayn enjoy sweetness? Why should they not feel the impact of Saeedah’s jealousy? She hopes for Hanadi to kick and scream at them today.

Lujayn and Muneer exchange a look. Do they think she doesn’t notice? But they don’t call out her lie.

“We don’t need to waste time standing here,” Lujayn says. “She’s going to enjoy the rides at the amusement park. Right, love?” Lujayn kisses Hanadi on the cheek.

“Carousel!” Hanadi says.

“You’re not taking her there.”

“I told you not to say anything yet, Lujayn.” Muneer puts a proprietary hand on Hanadi’s head.

“What did you tell Lujayn not to say?”

“She didn’t give me a chance to ask you. We want to take Hanadi to the amusement park.”

The casualness of his gestures and his voice makes Saeedah want to scream. She fights the urge to yank her daughter out of Lujayn’s arms. She and Lujayn played together as children, throwing and catching pebbles on the rooftop the way the neighbor girls here play with jacks on the sidewalk. Lujayn bossed the other cousins and lied about what was in front of them: a pebble she failed to catch, the number of pebbles in her palm. Always needing to go first, needing to win. It irks Saeedah that Hanadi seems content in Lujayn’s arms—not giggling or flirting with her aunt, but not fidgeting, either. Muneer touches his forehead to Hanadi’s and she puts her hand on his shoulder.

They are already cutting Saeedah out of the picture, and they haven’t left the porch. She tries to remember why she’d flirted with him behind her parents’ backs. He’d been curious for new places, willing to take a risk by driving alone with her, though he’d acted nervous the whole time. Why is he settling for going back to Saudi and telling the stories society will allow, like her father?