According to my digital clock, I scratched for about ten minutes while I listened to Sonia sleep. Then I decided to go to the bathroom to get my medicine. Once I was in there (with one eye open), I held my hand under hot water for just ten seconds, to see if it would stop the itching long enough for me to go back to sleep. I hated being the only person awake because it made me lonely. You might think a person can’t get lonely that fast, but I can. I wanted to get back to sleeping as fast as I could.

With my one eye, I saw the bathroom door, which I hadn’t closed all the way, opening wide, and then Dad was there, blinking in the light. He turned off the hot water and pressed my hand into a towel, his hands flat on the sides of mine. Then he opened the cabinet for my ointment, which he put on the right places between my fingers and on my palm. I did the backs of my knees myself. Dad said, “Hot water is a five-second solution, Bea. Remember? It never lasts. Use the medicine.” He put the tube of ointment away and left.

When I turned off the bathroom light, the apartment went dark, but then I opened my closed eye and I saw everything.

Sisters

I have an old-fashioned tape recorder that used to belong to my grandpa—my dad’s dad. It still works, with D batteries. When Dad was little, his dad read to him at night and recorded the stories so that Dad could hear them again whenever he wanted. When I was little, Dad and I listened to some of them together. Now I listen by myself. I never met my grandpa, because he died when my mom was pregnant with me.

I had never told anyone about those tapes before, not even Angus. My grandpa had this voice, sort of slow and careful but with a big smile in it. It was like Dad had shared that voice with me, and I was helping him keep it.

On her second night with us, I let Sonia listen to my grandpa’s very first story tape. I know it was the first one because he wrote dates on all the labels. This one said: 3/8/1983, Frog and Toad.

Sonia had slept really late that morning, and Dad wouldn’t let me wake her up. Then he made chicken tacos for lunch, and the four of us bundled up and took Rocco for a long walk in the park, where Jesse introduced Sonia to all of Rocco’s dog friends (and their owners). Everything was really good until Sonia Skyped with her mom after dinner. Then she did a bunch of crying in the bathroom. I was so afraid she would go home.