What I need is to talk to someone. But I know there’s no one I can talk to, not without giving Sam away. If she’s not straight and not out, then that’s by choice. My mind goes to Jared Abrams, a theater kid who came out last year just before he graduated. Before that, though, I remember the jokes and teasing, and how he seemed to flinch at the way people pushed and prodded at something he wasn’t ready to share. I didn’t understand how normally nice-seeming people could be so thoughtless. It still hurts to think of some of those moments, and what that must have been like for Jared.

I would never want Sam to experience something like that. I will just have to figure this out for myself.

I go downstairs and manage to autopilot my way through cake and gifts. My dad chose the cake — from St. Honore, the French bakery we both love — and it has all my favorite things: chocolate, caramel, and almond. It might as well be cardboard, for all I enjoy it. Mom, who avoids sugar since her diagnosis, has an obligatory sliver. Thankfully Dad and Jonah enjoy it enough for all of us.

My main present is the promise of a new laptop for college next fall. Fall seems so far away as to be unreal, but I manage to express my gratitude. There are other gifts, too: earrings, chocolates, books . . . My mom gives me a hand-drawn certificate for a “girls’ day” together: lunch and pedis. And my dad, not to be outdone, gives me a certificate for a FREE LUNCH WITH DAD, ANY DAY. He sketched the Reed griffin in the upper-left corner. He’s looked forward to our lunches at Reed since he got tenure there when I was in seventh grade.

“What if I don’t get in?” I joke. I know my scores and grades are well within range.

“No chance,” he says. “Who wouldn’t want my brilliant daughter?”

I don’t give the answer that always comes to my mind — my birth mother — although it amazes me that he doesn’t understand what he’s saying. The important part is that he honestly can’t imagine anyone not wanting me, and so, in a way, that kind of thoughtless remark is the greatest gift of them all.

With a stab of guilt, I think about the DNA test. I need to tell my parents. The discomfort I feel over having done it without telling them first makes me know I need to make it right. But I can’t face it yet. The idea of another emotional upheaval on top of what’s happened with Sam is too much.

“Zoe?” My mom pauses from cleaning up the cake plates and tilts her head at me, her expression concerned. “Are you okay? You’re really out of it. Have you heard from Sam about her aunt?”