This manipulation technique worked on me last year, and it took a family therapist to explain what was happening. My own sister is gaslighting me. Just because I don’t get vibes like her and Mom doesn’t mean I don’t know when someone’s lying to me.

“Your logic’s faulty,” I say. “It sounds like you’re reasoning that if you use, it’s my fault.”

I stand up and I try to take her hand, but she backs away, this tide of her always receding.

“You’re lying to me.” I say this very nicely, but her reaction is immediate, as if she’s cesium—one of the most reactive alkali metals—and I’m water.

There is an explosion.

“Wow. Wow, Mae. Well, you know fucking everything about everything and I’m just your dumb sidekick, so, yeah, sure, you’re probably right. I’m lying to you. That’s all I do, right, because I’m an addict and I’m opening my mouth, so I must be lying.” She throws her backpack on. “I wish I could get tested right now just to see the look on your face when you find out I’m not fucking high right now and you’re actually, for once, wrong about something.”

She’s shaking, and her voice carries on the breeze so that her anger surrounds us completely, a whirlpool. I could stop right now, stay on Hannah’s good side, apologize. But Mom and Dad would never forgive me if I let her do this to herself. I would never forgive me.

“Maybe you’re not currently high, as you say, at this moment. But you were at lunch.” I step closer to her. “You’re lying to me. Every day. I know you are. I know you have more pills.”

“And why is that, Mae? Hmmmm. Could you have reached that conclusion because you stole the ones I did have from under my goddamn pillow after pretending to have a sister moment with me?”

“No. I reached that conclusion because you didn’t say a WORD to me after I threw those pills away. Which was very suspicious.” I cross my arms. “You would have been a lot more mad at me if you couldn’t have gotten more.”

“Oh, so now you’re Sherlock fucking Holmes. Whatever, Mae. Also, for the record, trust me, I am a lot more mad at you.”

Sometimes, trying to talk to Hannah is like attempting to solve the Riemann hypothesis. My sister is a pure mathematics conundrum.

“You have to stop this, Nah. It’ll get bad again—it already is! I know it’s so, so hard. Everything is mostly horrible right now. No one understands more than me! But, Nah, what would they say if they knew—”

As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I regret them.