Maddie takes a shower while Quinn makes her face up. Maddie likes a long shower, likes to steam the mirror, so Quinn puts on her makeup in her room. She can hear her daughter singing, some made-up song to a tune she recognizes from Moana. She smiles at herself in the mirror, proud she has a girl who she can trust to be left alone like this. Every teacher Maddie’s ever had has loved her; she’s great with grown-ups, though Quinn has also noticed that she has no friends her age. Quinn mostly had no friends either, when she was her age. She didn’t like having to bring kids home because her house was small and dark and she mostly made her own dinners because her mom was often working. She wonders if her mother will be nicer, better, in her new house. Fresh start! another woman wrote in the comments below the photo album.

“Save some water for the whales,” she calls to Maddie.

“It’s fresh water, mom,” says Maddie. “I should save it for the humans.”

Quinn puts gunk underneath her eyes and rubs it until she looks five years older than she is. She puts on lipstick and mascara. She hears Maddie pad from the bathroom to her door. “Socks,” she calls. If Maddie doesn’t put socks on now she’ll call to Quinn in the middle of the night because she’s cold.

“You look pretty,” says Maddie, standing in the doorway in the fleece pajamas Alice gave her, her socks crooked on her feet.

Quinn smiles at her, reaching down to even out the socks’ seams, thinking that she was once, maybe, pretty, but now she looks too much like her mother: tired, worn out.

“Can I sleep with you when you come back?”

“You’re almost seven.”

“You’re twenty-three.”

“I can’t sleep with you flailing at me.”

“What if I promise not to move the whole time?”

“Not possible,” Quinn says.

“I won’t even breathe.”

“I guess, then,” Quinn says, smiling. She kisses the top of her head. “Two shows, tops, and then you can flail right next to me.”

7

“Everybody’s starving,” Alice says, pulling open the first pizza, a flash inside her brain of Quinn and Maddie laughing. “And Aunt Alice needs a drink.”

Henry helps the last kid doff coat and boots, and Tess says they all need a hot bath before dinner. “They’re fine,” says Martin.

“They’ll catch a chill,” Tess says.

“I’m so hungry I might faint,” says Jack.

Alice hands out paper plates, ignoring Tess, and pours herself three thumbs of bourbon.

“You guys have fun with your aunt and uncle?” says Kate, coming down the stairs with Josh.

“The most,” says Jamie.

“Mommy,” Bea says. Her braid is mussed and loosened by her wool hat. She holds tight to Henry. “Tell my mom how fast I went,” she says.