Serena had the real power among us. I had always known this. Now I wanted her to use it. Hadn’t we learned that she would? Hadn’t we learned that she would lead us all over the edge at the least provocation, with a smile on her face?

Did I want that for Janet?

Oh yes, I wanted it.

Perhaps you will blame me, by the end. It’s all right if you do.

Here, this will help: almost a year after my father left, my mother called me into her bedroom. She was yelling. I can’t tell you now what it was I had done; it hardly matters. She was yelling, and she was trying on clothes in front of her enormous walk-in closet. She was always doing two things at once, my mother. This closet was a space that held immense interest for me, and not only because I was forbidden to enter it. There were so many different colors, so many textures inside. My mother had silks and brocades, leather and velvet and nylon and lace and suede and satin and other things I touched and touched but have never identified. Because of course, yes, despite being forbidden, I had been inside, and had buried my face in all of her coats, raked my fingers through all her sleeves. I had even, while she was out, tried things on in her giant mirror, but of course nothing looked right. Everything of hers was too long, too tall, too small in the waist for me. Although there was one dress—black silk, with a low front—that, when I pulled it on and stood the right way, made me feel beautiful, or if not exactly beautiful, then at least worthy of being looked at.

Anyway, I can’t remember why she was trying on clothes. There was a party that night, maybe, though not at our house. It was a Friday, I’m sure. That I remember, because of what happened next.