A single light was on in the kitchen, which I knew was my mother, up early, making coffee, the dogs lying at her feet. She’d be wearing the soft clothes that she preferred for writing—an old pink bathrobe over soft pants, and her hair would be piled thick on her head, streaked through with gray. She hadn’t heard me come in, so I watched her for a moment—the steady thin stream of water over the grounds, the slow trickle into the carafe. I knew she loved this ritual—it took forever but it made her feel like an alchemist—but I’d never actually been up early enough to see it.

It looked so nice that for a moment I regretted coming, or at least regretted not sending her a text, warning her that I was on the way. It’d been too late to call, and then too early, and now I couldn’t bear the thought of her solitude being disturbed—and what a way to disturb it, too. HEY, MOM, I THREW A PIE THROUGH A WINDOW AND ALL MY FRIENDS—and also that one guy from Power Jam—HATE ME. I contemplated slipping out the back door, continuing to drive, east maybe, until the car ran out of gas.

But then the dogs saw me, and she saw me, too, and then there was no turning back.

“Surprise,” I said weakly.

“Cece!”

Her arms were around me so quickly I’d wondered why I’d ever left home. Why would you leave a place where an alchemist hugged you good morning, where you could lay your cheek against the shoulder of a soft pink bathrobe the same way you’d done as a baby, where dogs would whine with happiness and lick your knees hello?

“You scared me,” she said. “What are you doing here? What’s wrong?”

She was still hanging on to me. My mother’s specialty—besides convincing people that the transits of particular planets would have an impact on whether they should sign financial contracts on particular days—was long hugs. We’d stand there till noon if I didn’t initiate disentanglement, which I did now.

“Hi,” I said. “Nothing’s wrong.”

“But it’s so early,” she said. “Are you sick? Do you have a fever?”

She laid a cool hand against my forehead. Buckets set about licking my ankles, which he would do for the next fifteen minutes unless I stopped him. Tabitha, gorgeous girl, clever baby, observed me with her trademark superior air. I wondered if she’d get along with Jacques. Between the two of them, they could probably figure out how to rob a bank.

“I’m fine,” I said—a grand total of three minutes before I snapped at her, which was probably a new record. “I just thought it’d be fun to come say hi for a little bit.”