There’s three hundred bucks in his wallet. Cash. He doesn’t trust banks. I start out thinking I’ll spend it all, but then I feel bad and rein it in to a hundred. It’s not all he has. There’s probably a stash in a hole cut in the mattress or taped under one of Irene’s dusty-pink La-Z-Boys. It could even be in the truck somewhere, so Irene won’t come across it while she’s cleaning. It’s not like he doesn’t owe me, but there won’t be any more coming in for a while. So I take four twenties and two tens and shove them in the back pocket of my jeans as I walk across the Big M parking lot. Inside, I grab a cart and hit the aisles. Family sizes and name brands on everything. No more store brand toaster cakes and dented tuna cans for me. I spend five minutes debating the merits of yellow American cheese singles versus white ones before I decide to buy both and do a taste test. I buy Pop-Tarts in five different flavors and Coke in glass bottles that look like they came from the fifties. I get three bags of cheese puffs like the ones Margo got us that time—the ones that are more crunchy than they are puffy. I buy cold medicine, ibuprofen, and tampons, and stock up on soap and toilet paper so I don’t have to steal from school. I walk around for over an hour filling up the cart, counting on my fingers and rounding up to make sure I don’t go over a hundred. I don’t want to pull out my dad’s wallet at the store. And I don’t want to have to put anything back. Not today.

In line at the checkout, this woman behind me with frosted mom hair and a big coupon wallet watches me unload my cart onto the conveyor belt. “Sweetheart, I think you missed a few food groups,” she says, like she thinks I’m dumb enough to hear it as suggestion instead of criticism.

“It’s for a party,” I say.

When the checker rings everything up and it only comes to ninety-three dollars, I pick out two Mars bars, a bag of M&M’s, and four packs of Juicy Fruit from the rack next to me. Mrs. Coupon Wallet shakes her head. “Take the change off her bill,” I say to the checker, while Coupon Wallet is busy loading her six gallons of milk onto the belt. It’s only a dollar and change, but I’m sure it’s enough to throw her off her game.