Something in your chest came unhinged after that, and some silvery essence poured out of you, some faith that the world was basically good. What put you out of sorts when you were fourteen? You smelled smoke and could imagine that was what burning hair smelled like. Seeing people on the street, you kept wanting to unlock their faces and get at what was behind them. Bad things just happen sometimes. In the month after that you felt like the apple lying next to a rotten apple in the barrel, picking up its mold. Absolutely none of this is happy, there is nothing happy in this story, except that across from you with her brown little eyebrows drawn together, Maura doesn’t remember a word of it. Like she was written up by someone else.

It’s a surprise your mother didn’t remember Mr. Shelbert, really. That house burning, that would’ve made a nice backdrop. Thematically appropriate.

* * *

You buy a pregnancy test. You definitely aren’t pregnant. It’s been months since you had sex. Of late, especially, you haven’t been in the mood. Maura is still in the backseat of your car. There’s an essay in your mother’s collection titled “Gestation.” You buy the test anyway, take it home.

You pee on it, and a little on your fingers. Even if you were pregnant, a not-so-virgin Mary pushing out your own childhood, you could get an abortion. Maura is sitting on the edge of your bathtub. She’s eight and wearing her hair in braids you’re almost tempted to undo for her because you know your mother does them too tight. You imagine you’re at the park with a baby and someone points at Maura, the other Maura, and says, Oh, that one looks just like you. Obviously the pregnancy test is negative and you throw it away, and when Maura asks, “Why do you have to pee on it? Why don’t they have one for your mouth or something?” you ignore her. You’re not sure it’s ethically possible to justify having children right now, the weather is changing and the inhabitable land is shrinking, Congress has passed a bill that deregulates something, though you’ve already forgotten what and just how bad it is. Sometimes when you try to think about the future you have panic attacks. Is it fair to give a child what the world has left? But you do think you’d be an all right mother.

* * *

When you drop that tenth Maura off, your body is still tingling with not being fully known. After your mother sends her inside, she looks you up and down, takes in the longest breath, and lets it out in the longest sigh.

“Why can’t you just keep her for a day or two?” she says, shaking her head at you, like you’re heartless.

You’re not heartless. “I shouldn’t have to.”