Michelle and Alex walk past a bunch of houses that look like theirs but with nobody living in them, then past the one that looks like theirs but has bushes planted in front and a lady named Miss Tami living inside, then out the front gate that doesn’t have any gate on it, just gate hinges and big stone posts and signs that say SANDIA HILLS and LOTS FOR SALE—DISCOUNTED PRICES!!! Randy is friends with somebody who stayed here and he said it would be fine for them to live there for a while, too. Alex likes the neighborhood because Momma says he can play in the street because there are never cars around, so he throws baseballs against the sides of empty houses. Plus, lots of cute cats keep showing up from somewhere, and he says rawr at all of them.

As they walk, Alex thinks about what Momma said, turns it over and over like it’s a penny but strange. Is it lying to say I forgot? He thought lying was something else, like saying you didn’t break a window when you did or you don’t miss your grandpa when you do. He thinks it’s not lying because their neighborhood doesn’t even have street signs and the houses don’t have numbers yet, they’re too new. “Momma’s not a liar,” he says to the back of Michelle.

“What?” She turns around. Walking to the bus the other day Michelle told Alex they were homeless, but he didn’t think that’s right, either, because first they lived with Randy and then in the Grandpa House and now they live here. That’s three homes, not no homes. That night, he asked Momma about it and she asked him why he was asking and he told her what Michelle had said. Momma told him he shouldn’t worry about Michelle and what she thinks, that it’s hormones and that Alex should be nice to her, but then after that he heard Momma yelling at Michelle about how she’s fat and mean and gonna get them in trouble, and Alex thought that that wasn’t being very nice.

“Hurry up,” she says when he doesn’t answer. Michelle is walking fast because she’s sure they’ll miss the bus. She worries this will happen every day but most days they don’t.