Well, us girls didn’t get to spend all that much quality time together, as it turned out. We did some clothes shopping, which I know women are supposed to love, and I know it’s a big mother-daughter buddy thing, but I’ve hated it all my life, and I always will, I know that, too. Except part of the bonding is having a long, chatty lunch afterward, and that’s all right. And we applied for our passports, which was definitely an adventure, because Sally found my birth certificate but not hers, so we turned the whole apartment totally upside down until it finally showed up in the piano bench, which figures. Then we had to get our pictures taken, and I came out looking like a pink smudge, the way I always do—and then we had to go downtown to the passport office, and that took all day just by itself. But it was exciting, if you didn’t think about what it really meant, which I’m good at. And we did go to an English movie that night, and Sally fell asleep with her head on my shoulder.

But she was mostly frantically busy, the way I’ve said, and when we were home together she didn’t like to go out much, because Evan might call. When she had any free time, she made lists, millions of lists. I’d find them all over the house—stuff to pick up, stuff to get rid of, people to call, people to make sure to say goodbye to, questions about cleaning the apartment, about which way to ship stuff, questions to ask Evan about London schools—even a list just of things she knew about Evan’s boys, Tony and Julian. That’s my main memory of her in that time, sitting at the kitchen table, entirely surrounded by little boxes of Chinese food, leaning on her elbows with one hand in her hair. Making lists.

A couple of her friends practically lived with us, helping her with the packing and cleaning and running errands. Louise Docherty, who’s a composer, and Sally’s best bud, and laughs like a car alarm—anyway, there was Louise, and there was Cleon Ferris, black and gay and shorter than I am, who did lighting for concerts and musicals, and used to baby-sit me all the time. Norris brought me home one night—I was still working on Norris, trying to—and we walked in on the three of them, sitting on the floor, wrapping and taping up one box after another. Norris said, “Well, don’t you look like the Weird Sisters?” and Louise turned and looked at us, Norris and me, and said, “You look like Death and the Maiden.” And went back to wrapping boxes.

I didn’t help pack. I didn’t do a thing Sally didn’t yell at me to do. I got some of my own stuff into boxes—clothes and books and albums and things—but I didn’t close up the boxes, or label them, or anything like that. Like I said, I kept figuring I could maybe make all this craziness not be happening by acting as though none of it was happening. So I mainly hung with Jake and Marta, getting lifted, and watching game shows on TV. My grades went straight to hell that last term, and Sally got on me about it, but you could see she was always thinking about a million other things—she wasn’t even there when she was yelling at me. It was very weird. I actually found myself almost wishing Evan would come back.

Also I got sick a lot that summer. I don’t mean anything big or dramatic, just colds and stomach stuff, and the strep throat I usually get in May every year. Then I’d get into bed and curl around Mister Cat, and find a classic rock station because he can’t stand heavy metal, and I’d mostly sleep for a couple of days. One time Cleon Ferris came in to look at me, and he sat down on the edge of my bed and said, “Jenny. Little sugar.” He always called me that, since I can remember. He said, “Give it up, Jens. Short of terminal mogo on the gogo, there is no way you are not going to England with your mother. The deal’s down, cookie.”

I didn’t even turn around. I said, “I’m not faking it. And it wouldn’t be anybody’s damn business if I was.”

“That’s were,” Cleon said. “If I were. They get on you in England about stuff like that.” He reached over my shoulder and scratched the little soft place under Mister Cat’s jaw. Then he said, “I lived in London for a while. Long ago, in another world. I liked it pretty much, most of the time.” His face was sort of like an acorn, and there was a space between his front teeth, so when he smiled, he looked about seven. He said, “But what I really liked, little sugar, you go to a new place where nobody knows you, and you get to be someone else, anyone you want to be. Even black dwarfs, you’d be amazed. I recommend it.”

I didn’t say anything, just pretended to be falling asleep, and Cleon finally said, “Yeah, well, keep it in mind,” and left. He died a couple of years ago, from bone cancer. I think he had it then, when he was sitting on my bed talking to me.

A couple of weeks before school was out, Mr. Hammell called me into his office and asked me if it was true about us going to England. When I told him yes, his face changed—the lines down his cheeks sort of smoothed out, and his eyes were so sad and puzzled. Although they were mostly like that anyway. “Oh,” he said. “Oh, that’s a pity, Jenny. I was certainly anticipating having you in Advanced next year.”

“Me, too,” I said. “I’m sorry.”

Mr. Hammell stood there in front of me, looking younger every minute. He asked me, “Jenny, are you happy about this? Is this what you want? You’re important to me—to the class. I really want to know.”

I didn’t know what to say. I just nodded finally. Mr. Hammell said, “Well. Well, that’s good, then. That’s good. Good for you, Jenny.”

Then he did a strange thing. He reached out, awkward and slow, and put his hand on my cheek. It felt cold and shaky, like my Grandma Paula’s hand.

Mr. Hammell drew his hand down my cheek. He said, “Jenny, you take care of yourself over there in London. Go see a lot of plays, and remember us, because we’ll be thinking about you. I’ll be thinking about you.” He pushed my hair back a little and his voice got so low I could hardly hear him. “You’re going to be so pretty,” he said. “You remember I told you.”

I don’t know if that counts like sexual harassment; and I’ll never know if Mr. Hammell was really trying to hit on me or what. But I remember what he said, to this day, and I always will, because he was the first person who wasn’t family who ever said that to me. Whatever was going on in Mr. Hammell’s head about me, it must have been strange, and Meena’s probably right, maybe I should have reported him. But I’m not sorry I didn’t.

Another definitely weird thing that happened was that Mister Cat started staying really close to home, following me from room to room and miaowing every minute, which he never does unless he’s just starving or completely pissed. He wouldn’t let me out of his sight, no matter how much the Siamese Hussy yowled in the street. It was scary, actually, because he’s not like that. I should have known he knew something.

I found out what it was the same day Evan came back. Sally went to the airport to meet him, but I was at a Mets game with Norris. Not that either of us is that crazy about baseball—I just didn’t want to be there for the big reunion scene, and Norris wanted to aggravate Sally about all the family-tradition stuff I’d be pining for in England. And each of us knew what the other was doing, so it was fun in a way, although we didn’t say anything. Anyway, I made sure I didn’t get home until pretty late, but Sally and Evan still weren’t in yet. So I talked on the phone with Marta for a while, and watched some TV, and then I went to bed with Mister Cat tucked about as close under my armpit as he could get. He hadn’t slept like that since he was a kitten.

I must have drifted off myself, because all of a sudden Sally was sitting beside me, asking me if I was awake. I sat up fast and said, “I’m awake, I’m awake, is there a fire?” Because there was a fire once, a bad one, when I was little and we were living on West Eleventh, and Norris was still with us. I dreamed about that fire again just a couple of nights ago.