“Out of all of Felix’s passion projects,” I say, laughing so hard that I snort, “this is truly the one that got away. I remember he refused to talk to Grandma for months after she insulted this screenplay. He wouldn’t let me look at it.” I flip through more pages. It appears Lisabella endures two pregnancies that each reach full gestation, both occurring within a span of twelve months. She discovers that she isn’t the mother of the second child she gives birth to, which prompts an investigation into who Napoleon might have been fooling around with. He also has an evil twin brother who steals his identity.

“Speaking of movies.” Hall slumps down the wall, head lolling from one shoulder to the other. I’ve never seen him so stressed. “How are you going to back up this ruse? This pretend movie you just invented?”

“Can’t you simply . . . make a movie? Make your hand go swishety-swish and bam! It’s on Netflix. My Eyre Ladies, starring Bettie Hughes and Kat Dennings. Produced by Hall . . . Andaise.”

“I don’t know if I can do that.”

“Because hollandaise is a sauce?”

“Because cinema is sacred to me.”

I sigh, preparing to make my case, but an open-handed slap on the door interrupts. My grandmother never knocks. She likes to hit doors as if they’ve just mistaken her for Jane Fonda (they’ve been in a bitter feud for three decades). “What are you doing in there?” Grandma demands, trying the door handle. Hall evaporates the boulder, I stuff Leon of Naples back into its box, and we step far away from the door as my daunting grandmother (a beautiful and intimidating woman, five feet ten inches, somewhere between the ages of seventy and one hundred and four, her hair now in victory rolls) sweeps in. She likes to tell her granddaughters that older fashions are classier, as if none of us have seen posters of her enormous ’80s perm and spandex bodysuits.

“I said, what are you doing?” she repeats crisply, sizing up our blood pressures and temperatures with one sweep. “Are you searching for the necklace?”

“No?” Maybe now I am. “What necklace? How many carats does it have?”

“There is no necklace. Never you mind.” She analyzes me. “I thought you were taller.”

“I’m five seven.”

“Because you don’t drink enough water. Just look at that crepey skin around your eyes! We must take care of our face.” Before I can come up with a reply, she’s already twisting, heading back downstairs. “Follow me. No more lurking in my tower like weird little Rapunzels.”

Hall and I don’t dare argue. We trail a healthy distance from Grandma (the black lace train of her cloak is seven feet long), who leads us past a number of small bedrooms where my family members are busy unpacking their suitcases. Kaia gets the third floor to herself, thanks to the migraine-inducing incense she burns all hours of the day. “Barely have enough room for you all, and yet you continue reproducing,” she grumbles. “What is this, the Four Seasons?”