Sofia and Antonia know that they are to tell a grown-up before going to one another’s houses, but not why. Their world consists of the walk to and from the park in the summers, the clang and hiss of winter radiators, and all year round, the faraway splash and echo of men working the docks. They know certain things absolutely, and do not know that there is anything they do not know; rather, the world comes into focus as they grow. That’s an elm tree, Antonia says one morning, and Sofia realizes there is a tree in front of her building. Uncle Billy is coming for dinner tonight, says Sofia, and Antonia suddenly knows that she hates Uncle Billy: his pointed nose, the shine of his shoes, the stink of cigars and sweat he leaves in his wake. Cross the street or you’ll wake the maga, they remind each other, giving a wide berth to the smallest building on the block, where everyone knows—but how do they know?—that a witch lives on the third floor.

Sofia and Antonia know that Uncle Billy is not their real Uncle, but he is Family anyway. They know they are to call him Uncle Billy, like Uncle Tommy, and that they have to play nicely with Uncle Tommy’s children at Sunday dinner. They know there will be no discussion in this regard.

They know that Family is everything.

—

Sofia lives in an apartment with three bedrooms and a wide window in the kitchen, which looks out onto the no-backyard-access backyard. The landlord sits out there in the summer with no shirt on and falls asleep with cigarettes dangling from his thick fingers. The midday heat burns the places his body is exposed to the sun, leaving the underside of his round belly and arms lily-white. Sofia and Antonia are not supposed to stare. In Sofia’s room there is a bed with a new bedspread, which is red flannel; there are three dolls with porcelain faces lined up on the shelf; there is a plush rug she likes to sink her toes into.

Down the hall from her bedroom there is her parents’ room, where she is not supposed to go unless it’s an emergency. Cara mia, her papa says, there have to be some things just for Mamma and Papa, no? No, she responds, and he makes claws of his hands and chases her down the hall to tickle her, and she shrieks and runs. And then there is an empty room with a small cradle from when Sofia was a baby, which is no one’s. Her mamma goes in there sometimes and folds very small clothes. Her papa says, come on, let’s not do this. Come on, and leads her mamma out.

Sofia has just started to notice that people are afraid of her father.