I watched Gloria close the door. She was talking but I couldn’t hear what she was saying. My heart slapped my chest and I put my face on the cold wall. My stomach bug was really bad. Maybe I was going to throw up. When I heard her coming close to the stairs I scrambled back to my bed.

“Maisy! You don’t move, you hear me? Not one toe leaves this room.” She closed my curtains and everything went gray. “What foolishness I got to deal with. I swear Telly got himself mixed up with a screwball nutcase this time.”

I curled up under the covers. “Gloria, my middle hurts.”

“No, it don’t.”

“I got the stomach bug.”

“Don’t be a dimwit. You’re perfectly fine.” She picked up the green syrup bottle. Then she put it back down again.

“Oh,” I said.

“I won’t be gone long. You can read or draw or whatever it is you do to waste your time.”

I sat up. I felt better. “Did Mrs. Murtry’s car get broken?”

Gloria stopped and looked at me hard. “Belinda’s car? What do you mean?”

“You took it last night.”

“What?”

“You went for a drive, remember? It made you happy. With the windows open and the music.”

Gloria smiled. She smoothed my hair. “Oh, Bids. You were so turned around last night, so I won’t get too upset about your lies. It’s an awful, awful habit you got. I honestly don’t know how you can make such stuff up.”

I heard Gloria slam the front door. I looked out my window and she got in the brown car with the star on the side. When they drove away I saw her face was all scrunched. She looked like a fish in old water. The car went to the top of the circle and then it disappeared.

Then noise started. Tap, tap, tap. Tap, tap, tap. I heard a clicking coming into my room through the wall. There was a leaky pipe. Water dripping.

Or maybe it wasn’t water.

I squeezed my eyes together to keep out some ideas. My awful, awful habit. I tried to take big breaths.

Then I tried to find Jenny the Head, but she was lost again. Sometimes I thought she was magic. I reached under my bed and pulled out Rowan’s book of Stories for Boys. Gloria let me have it. It had colorful pictures. I think Gran gave it to him when he lived with her. I didn’t like to think about Gran. Gloria said she was dead, but I knew she was on our front porch and Gloria was talking to her. I even heard Gran’s voice.

I squeezed my eyes shut again.