I look around, suddenly aware that in addition to Marco on my hip, I have four other kids hovering around me. The twins are behind me with their fingers in their mouths, staring—and Fritzie is jumping up and down on one foot, saying, “Is this your mom, Marnie? Is this your mom? Marnie! Is this really your mom? Really? Your mom? Can I show her how I can slide down the railing all the way to the bottom? Or can I jump down the steps by threes? Which thing do you think she would like best? Which one? Do you think I can do it, Laramie? I did it four times yesterday and I only got hurt once. Look at this scratch on my leg. That’s what happens if you don’t do it just right.”

“She’s that one, the jumping one,” I say. “The talking one.”

“Ah,” says my mother. I can feel her taking in Fritzie’s tangled, unkempt hair, her snaggletoothed grin, the too-short plaid cropped pants with the star-studded leggings peeking out from underneath, the black sweatshirt that’s all stretched out in the neck, the pink Ugg ankle boots, and the fact that she’s standing on one foot teetering on the edge of the concrete steps. But my mom maintains a steady, accommodating smile. (I know that smile; it’s saying, “Later I’ll start my improvement projects on these people.”)

Laramie says he can jump down in threes, too—and the two of them push past Patrick and my mom and start hurtling themselves down the stairs. She applauds them all and then chucks Marco under the chin and says the thing she always says to babies: “Well, hi there, you squeezums!” (Babies are always squeezums, and puppies are poozums. I’ve lived my whole life under these conditions.)

“Happy Thanksgiving, I am so glad to see you!” she says. “Isn’t this just the most fun! It is so good to see you, darling, and my, you look like your life has gotten so busy and happy since I saw you last!” She shakes Gloria’s hand. “Hi, I’m Millie MacGraw, from Florida. And I think I’ve just done the astonishing thing of moving to Brooklyn.”

I am pretty sure I hear myself say, “You’re moving here? Where’s Dad?” but I can’t be sure because my head feels like a bunch of honeybees may have moved inside it. When did this become my life?

She’s sailing past me into the house. “Oh, it’s so lovely in here! I always just love these old-fashioned brownstones! The history!” she exclaims. She’s come to visit before, so none of it is new, but she does always feel the need to rhapsodize about brownstones and compare them to Florida’s one-story stucco houses. “Patrick, honey, don’t worry about these bags. Let’s just put these down here for now, and I’ll figure everything out when I know where I’m going to live.”

What?

“Where you’re going to live?” I say. “You’re moving . . . here?”

She turns, almost like a ballerina doing a pirouette, and looks at me with her wide, sparkling eyes. “Yes. I’m moving to Brooklyn.”

What I want to say is, “Where is my real mother, and who are you?” But instead I say, “But why?”

“Because you’re here,” she says, smiling. “And because I’m changing my life. And I just might be in need of your services, so it seemed smart to come get them right in person rather than over the phone. So . . . I’m here, darling, and I don’t want you to worry about this, because I’m going to get myself situated real soon and take care of myself.”

I catch a glimpse of Patrick’s face, which has an unreadable expression. He looks like somebody who might have just been hit in the head with a board.

“Have you eaten, Millie?” he says, and she answers, “Why, honey, I haven’t! Looks like I’m here right on time. Is there enough?”

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

MARNIE

When we go back into the dining room, I’m shocked to see Bedford standing up on one of the twins’ chairs, helping himself to a turkey leg.

“Bedford!” I yell, and he jumps down, looking appropriately guilty. I wait for my mother to say something about the bad manners of poozums, but she is trying not to look scandalized. I can see it in her face. Suddenly I feel like I’m seeing the whole house—my whole life!—from her point of view. All the chipped, mismatched plates, the couch cushions stacked up haphazardly on the children’s chairs, the stained Thanksgiving-orange tablecloth, the scarred wooden floor, the ratty lace curtains that belonged to Blix, the funky, colorful artwork on the wall—everything I’ve treasured about my own life here looks a bit shabby through the eyes of Millie MacGraw, who has matching everything and sterling silver platters and who prides herself on “making a nice home.”

“Mom, here. Sit down in my place. I’ll go get another plate and a fork and knife,” I say. Patrick brings over an upholstered chair from the front room while Gloria moves the children over so we can squeeze in another place setting. When she comes over to take Marco from me, he bats her away and squeals. He may now be a permanent fixture on my hip.

“I have never had such a dedicated fan,” I tell him and nuzzle his sweet little drooly neck. “You are pulling all the right strings with me, buddy.”

Patrick grimaces. “Can you eat that way? With him, I mean?”

“Of course I can! But anyway, who needs food when I have this much love?” I glide around the table to my chair, bouncing Marco on my hip.

My mother gets herself settled in. “Ohhh, look!” she says. “You put the marshmallows on the sweet potatoes! I had no idea you still made it the Southern way.”

“Well, sure I do. What other way is there? Right when you showed up, in fact, I was in here explaining about how sweet potatoes have to get marshmallowed up on Thanksgiving. Your arrival timing was perfect,” I tell her.

She smiles at me. “Isn’t timing always perfect? Didn’t you tell me that once?” Then she reaches over and pinches my cheek. “Sweetie, you do look rather fantastic with that baby in your arms. Better watch out, Patrick. She’s going to be wanting one of those of her own, I bet. First, though, forgive me for saying this, but I think y’all should have a wedding.”

“Me, too! Me, too!” says Fritzie.

Patrick takes a big bite of turkey. “Wow, this is delicious.”

My mother laughs.

“But you don’t have to get married to have a baby,” says Fritzie. “In case that’s what you’re talking about. I am Patrick’s kid, and he didn’t get married to my mom.”

I let out such a big sigh that Marco laughs and pokes me in the eye with a fat, wet finger.

“Well,” says my mother and helps herself to the mashed potatoes, “there’s nothing wrong with that. I’m beginning to think marriage isn’t such a great thing after all myself. Are you married, Gloria?”

“No—well, yes technically,” she says. “We’re . . . you know . . .”

“My dad’s in jail,” says Laramie cheerfully. “But he’s getting out soon, and then we’re going to move to Massachusetts and have a house. Right, Mom?”

“Right,” says Gloria.

I roll my eyes so hard at my mother that she looks back at me with comically googly eyes, and then she does a pantomime of locking her lips closed to show she’s not going to say another thing.