“We saw each other just last summer, Rita,” said Jane. “They moved the creek last summer, before that horrible day at Tommy’s parents’ house. And we have the puppy.”

They watched Rita’s mouth open. Her skin was so smooth she lacked expression. It was hard to look at her directly, as if something were wrong with her features, maybe even her smell. Polly turned away and let in a jumble of time and light: They’d cut off an oxbow in a creek along Lake Michigan and run through shallows while their parents were drunk and laughing. She mostly remembered the idea of Edmund, not his physical being. Yet here he was, paler and a little larger, now breathing noisily in her doorway, not a tan child standing in waves. She herself was a washed-out, skinny girl, nearsighted and born frayed, with black tangled hair.

No one had warned her that these people were coming to their house. Dee broke up the moment and pushed the children inside. She said things like, So, Edmund, this is the kitchen. We don’t keep a lock on the fridge. Let’s have a bit of something and we’ll show you a room you might like. She had Polly lead him up to the little bedroom next to her own, usually reserved for their old friends from the city.

All afternoon, Rita talked about the earlier times, when she and her husband, Thomas, and Jane and Merle had been in college together, when Polly and Edmund shared a crib or butted heads on a lawn outside of married housing in Ann Arbor. She had an accent—she’d been born in Ireland—but her voice was too loud, too sharp and piping, and because her face was so blank the noise seemed to come out of nowhere, a trumpet from a wispy halo of red hair. Polly, squirming at one end of the living room couch, tried to imagine the sticky plastic of the crib floor she’d shared with Edmund, the nylon web blocking their sight. They were foisting Edmund upon her, and she was watchful, because she sensed an explanation that hadn’t been offered, something wrong with either Edmund or his world beyond the clear issue of Rita.

When Papa came home, Polly saw disbelief and muffled anger. Dee explained the situation in a kind of a circle, moving right through any pause that might give Papa a chance to ask a question. Rita and Edmund Ward are living here for a bit. Let me get you a drink.

Papa followed Dee into the pantry with a set face. She could hear their voices through the wall, despite the fact that Rita grew louder and faster with every minute.

When Merle got home, Jane put him on the couch facing Rita’s monologue and hid in the kitchen with Dee. Papa worked behind a closed door, and Polly and Edmund stuck to their rooms.