I shook my head. “I think it could be both, like a spork is both a spoon and a fork. Let’s go outside.”

She narrowed her hazel-green eyes at me, which I didn’t think was in the shrink handbook, and said, “I’ll go outside if you’ll do something for me.”

“What is it?”

“I’ll tell you outside.”

“Okay.” When we were in the garden, I said, “Okay, what is it?”

“Let’s work awhile.”

I soon became engrossed in replanting a conifer that had outgrown its container.

When I stood back to admire my work, Lily said, “Who is your favorite humorous writer?”

I was glad she was going to talk about books. “I have lots, but Mark Twain would be one of my top three.”

“What’s his style? What’s his voice?”

“It depends on his topic, but he often wrote in first-person, past tense, and his narrators are frequently ironic or terrifically deluded,” I said. “I can recommend a few books, if you like.”

“What’s a ‘serious’ literary voice?”

I shrugged. “I was taught to write in present tense, third person, stripped-down emotionally detached prose.”

Lily raked leaves from under a bush. “Tell me about the time your mother left you at the mall, but this time describe it in present tense, third person.”

“But I already told you what happened.”

“You said you’d do what I asked if we could come outside. This time don’t call her ‘my mother Regina.’ Say ‘her mother.’” Lily did the eye squint thing again, and I realized that she had an edge under the smooth professional surface.

“Fine,” I said, and I wondered why I felt so annoyed. “The girl is ten years old and her mother takes her to the big indoor mall. At first she’s excited because her mother never takes her anywhere and she thinks her mother wants to be with her,” I said in an affectless voice. “Her mother is very thin, perfectly groomed, and perfectly coordinated in new clothes.”

“How did the girl feel?”

“She’s proud of her mother,” I said, surprised to remember how I’d felt at seeing her looking as striking as a crane in a flock of frumpish pigeons. “Her mother tells her to sit on the bench by the fountain and wait.”

“What happens then?”

“The girl does as she’s told because she wants her mother to be pleased with her. Her mother is never pleased with her. The girl waits and the hours pass. The girl watches other people buying and eating food, and she’s hungry because it’s lunchtime. She thinks of going to look for her mother, but that would make her angry and the girl will be locked in her room again.”

My mood, the happiness of being in the garden, was gone.

“Go on, Milagro.”