His eyes darken as he backs away from me. “You know, if you bring me back a present, it means that’s not true. That you do really like me.” He winks at me again and walks into the house before I can get another word out.

His advice echoes in my head.

He may joke around a lot with me, but when he gets all serious, he actually gives pretty good advice.

I make a vow to myself right then and there that when I get back from this trip, things will change. I’m not sure how it’s going to happen, but if I can survive seventeen years of being picked on, I sure as hell can figure out a way to finally make it stop.

I’M STILL TRYING to create an awesome plan on how to get Hannah to respect me, when my dad returns to the car.

“Ready?” he asks me as he fishes the keys from his slacks.

Nodding, I hop into the passenger seat.

My thoughts remain stuck in Awesome Plan Land for most of the thirty-minute drive across town. The only time the quietness is broken is when we stop at the drive-thru to get ice cream like my dad promised, and he asks me what flavor I want.

By the time we pull up to the Sunnyvale Bay Community, I’m still lost on how to make Hannah see me differently. It doesn’t seem possible, considering I’m basically trying to figure out a way to get Hannah, The Wicked Wench of the Anders’ House, to be nicer to me.

No, I can do this, I tell myself. I need to be more optimistic. I have a whole three months to figure this all out.

The Sunnyvale Bay Community looks like an ordinary apartment complex, except all the tenants are fifty-five and over. Grandma Stephy moved here about a year ago after my grandpa passed away from cancer. While my grandpa was a man of few words, he was probably my favorite family member besides Grandma Stephy. Whenever I visited, he’d take me down to the gas station to buy a soda and candy. We’d cruise on the back roads in his old truck, listening to old country singers, mostly Hank Williams and Johnny Cash, with the windows down, even if it was wintertime. He never took Hannah with us. Said she threw too many tantrums. Our drives always made me feel special, like someone actually wanted to spend time with me, like I was more than just Hannah’s dorky little sister who no one ever wanted around.

Man, I really miss those days and our drives.

“I’ll get your bags if you want to go up,” my dad says, interrupting my thoughts as he parks the car.

“Sure. Sounds good. Thanks.” I climb out of the car and head up the path to my grandma’s apartment.

I knock before opening the door and strolling inside. As I step foot over the threshold, my shoe bumps into Beastie, my grandma’s fat, old calico cat, and I fall flat on my stomach.

The cat hisses at me, like the crabby old fart he is.

“Dammit, Beastie,” I curse as I roll over onto my back, rubbing the knee I banged against the floor.

He growls and the hairs rise on his back as he scurries at me with his claws out. I scramble to get to my feet, but right as his claw is about to reach my leg, a pair of hands wrap around his belly.

“Now, Beastie, I thought we talked about this.” My cousin, Indigo, who’s two years older than me, scoops up the cat and lifts him so he’s eye level with her. Looking him dead in the eyes, she lectures, “It’s rude to trip people then try to eat their faces. You’re not a zombie. You’re a cat.”

Beastie hisses at her in response.

Sighing, she sets him back down on the floor and offers me her hand. “I’ve been telling Grandma Stephy that she needs to teach him some manners, but she says it’s useless, that he’s too old and already stuck in his ways.”

“She’s probably right.” When I take her hand, she helps me to my feet. I massage my achy knee. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but what’re you doing here? I thought you were in New York attending art school.”

“I was.” She tucks a strand of her blood red hair behind her ear and fiddles with one of her gauges. “Some stuff came up, though, and I had to leave.”

“Did you move back home?”

“Nah, my parent’s didn’t want to,” she makes air quotes, “‘encourage my dropout behavior’. I think they thought if they didn’t let me move back in that I’d go back to school.” She rolls her eyes as her hands fall to her sides. “I tried to explain to them that I didn’t dropout, that the school decided it was probably for the better if I take a permanent sabbatical. But you know parents. They hear what they want to hear.” She glares at Beastie as he hisses at her from underneath the coffee table. “Thankfully, Grandma Stephy took me in until I can figure out what the hell I should do with my life.”

I want to ask her what she did to get kicked out of school, but I don’t know Indigo that well. Her mother is my father’s sister and the two of them rarely speak to one another, other than when we’re at family reunions, and even then, the conversation is strictly formal. And my mom refuses to speak to hardly any of my dad’s relatives, because she says they act like a bunch of hippies.

All I really know about Indigo is that she’s into art and self-expressionism, through painting and with her body. I once heard her call her body a canvas. She has tons of tattoos and several piercings and does all sorts of crazy stuff with her hair, even shaving her head one time.

“So are you looking after Grandma Stephy’s house while we’re gone?” I ask, stealing a butterscotch from the candy dish.

She shakes her head, flopping down on the floral sofa. “Nah, I’m going with you guys.” She kicks her boots up on the coffee table and crosses her legs. “I figure a little trip overseas might lead me down a path to self-discovery.”

“Don’t let her fool ya with her artsy-fartsy talk,” Grandma Stephy says as she enters the living room. She’s cut her hair since the last time I saw her, but is still rocking the grey. She’s never really dressed very grandmother-ish and is decked out in a pair of rhinestone jeans and a pink t-shirt. “The reason she’s going is to see Peter.”

“Who’s Peter?” I peel the wrapper off the candy and pop the treat into my mouth.

“Some guy she met in New York who I guess lives in London,” Grandma Stephy explains as she opens her arms to give me a hug. “But enough about Indigo. I’ve heard enough about British guys to last me a lifetime. What I really want to hear about is you.” She wraps her arms around me and gives me the first hug I’ve had in months. “How you holdin’ up, honey?”

“I’m okay.” I hug her back, getting a whiff of hairspray and floral perfume. It makes me smile, because it’s so her and it reminds me that I’m here, with her, for the next three months, where maybe I won’t feel like such an outcast.

“It’s going to be okay,” she tells me, patting my back.

“Um, thanks.” I pull back, sensing something’s off. “Is something wrong? You seem a little, I don’t know, sad.”

She eyes me over. “I was just going to ask you the same question.”

Okay . . . what the hell is going on?

“Isabella’s fine,” my dad insists as he walks in and drops my suitcases on the floor. He locks eyes with Grandma Stephy and gives her a pressing look. “You and I need to talk privately about what to say and what not to say. I know how much you like to run your mouth.”

My grandma shakes her head at my dad. “Good grief, sometimes it’s hard to believe I raised you.”

My dad looks taken aback. “What the hell’s that supposed to mean?”

She narrows her eyes at him. “It means you’ve turned into an asshole over the years you’ve spent with—”

“Don’t you dare bring my wife into this,” he warns, his face reddening.

“I wouldn’t have to if she didn’t . . .” She trails off, glancing at me with worry.