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of Trikala and thought they were stuck for the night—until fourteen-year-old Eureka hailed an olive oil truck and they hitchhiked back to Athens. She remembered her mother’s arm around her as they sat in the back of the truck among the pungent, leaky vats of olive oil, her low voice murmuring: “You could find your way out of a foxhole in Siberia, girl.You’re one hell of a traveling companion.” It was Eureka’s favorite compliment. She thought of it often when she was in a situation she needed to get out of.
    “I’m trying to connect with you, Eureka,” Dr. Landry said. “People closest to you are trying to connect with you. I asked your stepmother and your father to jot down some words to describe the change in you.” She reached for a marbled notebook on the end table next to her chair. “Would you like to hear them?”
    “Sure.” Eureka shrugged. “Pin the tail on the donkey.”
    “Your stepmother—”
    “Rhoda.”
    “Rhoda called you ‘chilly.’ She said the rest of the family engages in ‘eggshell walking’ around you, that you’re ‘reclusive and impatient’ with your half siblings.”
    Eureka flinched. “I am not …” Reclusive—who cared? But impatient with the twins? Was that true? Or was it another one of Rhoda’s tricks?
    “What about Dad? Let me guess—‘distant,’ ‘morose’?”
    Landry turned a notebook page. “Your father describes you as, yes, ‘distant,’ ‘stoic,’ ‘a tough nut to crack.’ ”
    “Being stoic isn’t a bad thing.” Since she’d learned about Greek Stoicism, Eureka had aspired to keep her emotions in check. She liked the idea of freedom gained through taking control of her feelings, holding them so that only she could see them, like a hand of cards. In a universe without Rhodasand Dr. Landrys, Dad’s calling her “stoic” might have been a compliment. He was stoic, too.
    But that tough-nut phrase bothered her. “What kind of suicidal nut
wants
to be cracked?” she muttered.
    Landry lowered the book. “Are you having further thoughts of suicide?”
    “I was referring to the nuts,” Eureka said, exasperated. “I was putting myself in
opposition
to a nut who … Never mind.” But it was too late. She’d let the s-word slip, which was like saying “bomb” on a plane. Warning lights would be flashing inside Landry.
    Of course Eureka still thought about suicide. And yeah, she’d pondered other methods, knowing mostly that she couldn’t try drowning—not after Diana. She’d once seen a show about how the lungs fill with blood before drowning victims die. Sometimes she talked about suicide with her friend Brooks, who was the only person she could trust not to judge her, not to report back to Dad or worse. He’d sat on muted conference call when she’d called this hotline a few times. He made her promise she would talk to him whenever she thought about it, so they talked a lot.
    But she was still here, wasn’t she? The urge to leave this world wasn’t as crippling as it had been when Eureka swallowed those pills. Lethargy and apathy had replaced her drive to die.
    “Did Dad happen to mention I’ve always been that way?” she asked.
    Landry set her notebook on the table. “Always?”
    Now Eureka looked away. Maybe not always. Of course not always. Things had been sunny for a while. But when she was ten, her parents split up. You didn’t just find the sun after that.
    “Any chance you could dash out a Xanax prescription?” Eureka’s left eardrum was ringing again. “Otherwise this seems to be a waste of time.”
    “You don’t need drugs. You need to open up, not bury this tragedy. Your stepmother says you won’t talk to her or your father. You’ve shown no interest in conversing with me. What about your friends at school?”
    “Cat,” Eureka said automatically. “And Brooks.” She talked to them. If either of them had been sitting in Landry’s seat, Eureka might even have been laughing right now.
    “Good.”