“Ha, I guess.” Still smiling, Teddy faces me. “What about you, Nons? Maybe you can see the allure in being a ghost?”

And I fall into myself, at this prompt, because the truth is, I do see the allure in being a ghost—at least at first. Wandering the world invisibly, with no attachments. But I think of the spirits on Viloxin, born from blocked emotion, and I realize that ghosts don’t lack attachments at all—they are that attachment, in its most terrible, visceral form. They are pain and frustration.

I don’t ever want to be that.

“I don’t know,” I reply. Because: Why me? Why do I always have to be known as the quiet one, the loner, the shadow side to Tai’s light? My mind drifts back to last night with Hérrakí, a patch of sunlight in a gloomy year, an overcast life—even as I think, simultaneously, I am so screwed. Teddy catches my discomfort, and a look of concern clouds his face.

“Anyway, are you excited for NYU this fall? I’m so proud of you,” he says, circling back around, and pointedly avoiding looking at Tai.

When are we going to stop making small talk? I glimpse at the other men at the counter, whose eyes skim me before turning away. I open my mouth to answer, only to glimpse the back of someone tall and blond, speaking to the host in low tones behind the restaurant’s curtain.

“Super subtle, Ted,” Tai replies instead, folding her napkin into a tight little square.

He cocks his head. “You know I support whatever you two want to do. Marion told me you’re headed to Paris, and I think that’s just great, T. You can always go back to school and get your GED later, if you—”

“I’m not going back to fucking high school, okay? And everyone needs to stop treating me like I have a single-digit IQ,” Tai hisses, and I stop myself from rolling my eyes, only to catch none other than Antella Arnoix edging her platinum head out of the curtain behind her to greet the chef. Her sharp brown eyes snap to Tai, and I reach for my sister’s arm to stop her from saying anything more, but she continues: “I thought you of all people would get it, Teddy.” She expels the air from her mouth just as Antella steps through, folding her hands in front of her with an unreadable—but vaguely contemptuous—expression on her face. I pinch my lips together to keep from accidentally smirking because of the sheer awkwardness of it all, and Teddy reluctantly comes to his feet to kiss her cheeks, politeness compelling him. Tai rotates in slow motion, the blood draining out of her.

“It seems I’m always interrupting an intimate family moment,” Tai’s dream mother-in-law says coolly.