Lance just nods, and hurries to add, “But I didn’t come to bother you. I don’t mind that you’re here, if you want to be here. Maybe you worked something out with my dad and maybe you didn’t. It’s not my business either way. I haven’t lived here in a long time.”

That little speech comes pretty easily, considering it’s mostly bullshit. Sure, he doesn’t mind that they’re here, but his casual tone belies the fact that he’s been oddly drawn here ever since he realized the house was lived in. He can’t say why, but it’s true. He didn’t wind up standing in front of them solely out of a desire to put off facing Robbie.

The woman keeps searching his face. Finally, she seems to come to a decision. She rakes her upper teeth over her lower lip and then says, “I’m Nora, and this is Alice.” She lifts her chin a little, like she’s bracing herself for a challenge, and in that moment, seeing that stubborn little tilt to her head—Lance understands why he recognizes her.

He’s practiced the same look in the mirror, and it doesn’t look much different on his very similar face.

Still, it’s kind of a shock when she says it out loud.

“I’m your sister.”

The inside of the house looks almost exactly like Lance remembers, but it bears some signs of turmoil from the past six years. The old wallpaper is curling here and there from leaks; there’s a patch in one of the windows, made of cardboard and duct tape, where a pane was broken. There are new stains on the old floorboards.

Lance wonders how long the house was empty. Or maybe it wasn’t empty; maybe his father just stayed here, alone, for far longer than he should have, not much different than a feral animal building a nest.

Some of the unfamiliar details have nothing to do with abandonment, though. In mason jars around the room are dried flowers. Drawings, probably by Alice, plaster the refrigerator, which has its door cracked to keep air from being trapped inside—it’s unplugged, along with the other appliances. A small generator is in the living room, serving as the hub at the center of a space heater, a lamp, and an old laptop computer, all of their cords stretched toward the generator. Lance sees a neat stack of DVDs of kids’ movies next to the computer. Blankets curtain the living room windows, the sun stronger in the spots that are most threadbare so that the whole room looks dappled.

Nora watches Lance take it all in. She’s still wrapped in a blanket and wearing that expression that dares him to say something rude or sympathetic. He thinks the latter would be the worst received.

Alice, on the other hand, is enthusiastically guiding the tour. “This is my bed,” she says, pointing to one half of the pile of blankets, “and this is Mama’s. In the summertime, I sleep in my own room, but it’s cold right now. Do you want to see my room?”