“Wait a sec,” Mel says. “You are the one who is going to do this. Focus, Gigi. The phone will be on. You’ll have to unlock the screen, okay? Push this. The numbers come up. What’s my code?” Mel quizzes her.

“One zero four zero,” Rose answers.

“Good. And don’t think I’m not changing it the instant this is over. With all due respect. No offense meant.”

“With all due respect. None taken,” Rose says.

“Once it’s unlocked, press this. That’s home. Okay. Find the camera icon.”

Rose finds it.

“Touch it.”

Rose touches it.

“That’s all there is to it.” Mel’s fingers are clamped around the device.

“Put it in the box,” Rose insists.

“I am, I am,” Mel protests. She puts the cell phone into the tissue box, the screen facing the interior, the back of the phone pressed against the side where Rose cut the small hole. Holding the box on its side, several inches above her knees, Mel jostles the phone around while peering in the oval cutout where the tissues are meant to come forth. “Got it. The lens is perfectly aligned with the hole,” she says after a minute.

Rose leans over to look inside the box. On the screen of the phone a video of Mel’s knees is running.

“Let me tape the cell in place, so the image doesn’t get blocked.” Rose plucks up the packing tape from where she’s set it on the couch.

“That will leave my phone all sticky,” Mel complains.

“Windex will take it off,” Rose assures her.

After several attempts, Rose gets the phone taped securely to the side of the box, the camera lens aligned with the hole.

“Bluetooth,” Mel says, fishing a heavily packaged item out of the plastic sack.

The earpiece is not a great fit. Rose’s ears are small. Having pushed it in as far as it will go, she tapes it in place with pink cloth tape. In her early teens, that kind of tape was used to set pin-curls in front of the ears. The rest of the hair was rolled on juice cans to get the ideal bubble coif. Rose is surprised the stuff is still available.

Mel helps Rose get the wig back on straight. The hair covers the Bluetooth device and tape. But for a small pocket on the top, the scrubs offer nowhere to carry anything. During her raid on Izzy’s closet, Mel has taken a small dark-green fanny pack made of ripstop fabric. “Mom used to wear it to work sometimes, so it should be okay to have it.”

“Thank you, Mel. Thank you, Izzy. Here we go,” she says. She turns on her phone, then calls Marion.

“It’s me,” Marion answers.

“Are you ready to do this?” Rose whispers.

“I suppose,” Marion says.