“No,” Josie said. And she wanted Natalie’s hands back on her. She shifted from foot to foot and imagined she could count the thin blue lines on her aunt’s note card. At Matthew’s funeral, no one spoke, and the casket was white and decorated with stuffed teddy bears, and the carpet had been brown then. Yes; she remembered because her shoes had also been brown and when she pointed this out to her aunt, her aunt said nothing, and Josie realized that this was how it was going to be for a very long time. It made her sad and she began to cry softly into her aunt’s sleeve, and this seemed to make her aunt, who was sitting on one side of her, and her father, who was sitting on the other side almost happy, and she knew they thought she was crying because she missed her baby brother, but the truth was, she was crying because she knew no one would smile and say “That’s right,” when she pointed out that her shoes matched the carpet, or laugh and applaud when she sang the alphabet song, or tell her how adorable she was when she held her braids out and pretended to be an airplane, and she knew that they would be right in not doing so.

“When is this going to be over?” Josie asked.

“I don’t know,” Natalie whispered, “but you need to be quiet.”

Her aunt dabbed her eyes and returned to her seat, and when she did, her father stood. He had told her he wasn’t going to speak, but there he was putting one foot in front of the other, standing behind the podium, wiping his brow with his hand.

“I don’t want to listen to this,” Josie said.

“You have to.”

“I can’t.”

“Just try.”

Her father gripped the podium tightly. He was silent for a minute, his eyes closed, and when he opened them, he spoke. “I’m not really sure what to say, but I wanted to say something.” He wiped his brow with his palm again and rested his elbows on the podium. “I wanted to talk about how wonderful Carol was. I wanted to talk about how much we’ll miss her, and I think I speak for both Josie and myself.”

The tornado in Josie’s belly grew. A few people turned around and gave her consoling smiles.

“I want to leave,” she said.

“No.”

If Natalie wanted her to stay, she would have to do more than that. “Yes,” Josie said. Her voice was getting louder, and the funeral director looked over at her. She looked down at her hands, and her mother’s bracelet glinted in the harsh overhead lighting. The gold seemed too brilliant, the diamonds too luminous, and the bracelet hugged her wrist tightly.