Amy’s gaze travels toward the suitcases. For the briefest second, her eyes widen, and I know what she’s thinking—where are we gonna fit them? I asked myself the same question, but there was lots of stuff we needed to bring, and we didn’t have any smaller bags anyway.

Their apartment is tiny but nicer than ours. There are tall windows in the living room, which let in a surprising amount of light—by New York standards, that is. They have a nice kitchen, a big, cozy couch, and the entire place is covered in floral artwork—Amy’s doing, of course. She works at an art gallery in Chelsea, so she’s always had an eye for these things. If it were up to Jorge, the place would probably be covered in pictures of motorcycles and sports team logos.

“Do you need anything?” Amy asks Sophie and me. “Are you hungry?”

“N-no. I’m fine. Sophie, are you fine?”

My sister nods quickly.

“All right, then.” Amy flashes a smile at us, but I’m not sure it’s genuine. Ma and Pa have always said that Amy can come off as a little fake. Once or twice, my mom even said Amy makes her think of a robot. “Why don’t you take your things to the baby’s room?”

Uncle Jorge nods. “Come on,” he says. “Let’s get you settled in.”

He leads the way down the narrow hallway and through the first door on the left. The room is even smaller than I remember. The walls are painted light pink, and there’s baby stuff everywhere. In the space where the crib should be, there’s an air mattress, which I figure Sophie and I will have to share.

“But where will Ellie sleep?” Sophie asks.

“In our room,” Jorge says. I guess he and Amy found a way to make her crib fit in their bedroom after all.

None of this is ideal, but it’ll have to do for now. We hang a few of our clothes inside the tiny closet and shove our suitcases in at the bottom. They stick out, so that the closet door won’t even close, but again, it’ll have to do for now.

Before we know it, it’s almost two o’clock, and I need to head to the bodega for my shift.

“You don’t have to go,” Uncle Jorge says. For the past week, he’s had to keep an eye on the store. With my dad gone, it’s he who’s been scheduling shifts, and paying back suppliers, and making sure we’re well stocked on everything. Ever since he graduated, he’s worked at the same tech company downtown, and now I can’t understand how he’s been able to go to his day job and still find time to do all those things at the bodega.