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imagined the cover of a romance novel—a painting of me and Skateboard Guy. Our hair blowing in the wind, our shoulders bare, our faces clenched as we looked hungrily at one another.
    And then, as my eyelids grew heavy, I thought of the little paper cupid, set free, drifting out into the world on his own. Where did you go, little guy?
    Can I go with you?

 

    “Alice!” a voice called, followed by pounding.
    “Okay, okay.” I bumped my knee on the coffee table as I rolled off the couch. That kind of annoying pounding could only come from one person. After stumbling down the hall, I opened the door.
    “I’ve been knocking for like ten minutes,” Realm said. “What’s your problem? You’re late for dinner.”
    Was it dinnertime already? I leaned against the door’s frame. “I don’t have a problem. I was asleep.”
    “Asleep? What’s the matter with you? Are you sick?”
    “Nothing’s the matter with me.” So what if I’d slept away another afternoon? It was better than sitting around worrying about everything.
    Realm narrowed her blue eyes. “Are you depressed?”
    “No,” I said. But I questioned my response the second it burst from my mouth. Depressed people sleep in the middle of the day and I’d been doing that a lot lately. Like manic collecting, excessive sleeping was a really bad sign. A sign that the dark beast had chosen its next victim. A sign that my mother’s mental illness was waiting to be passed down like wedding china. Nothing scared me more than that. Nothing.
    “By the way, just so you know, your apartment stinks like clams.”
    “I bought some fish,” I said. Then added, with a jab, “ Lily .”
    “Don’t call me that.” Realm turned on her bare feet and marched away. Pasty skin peeked through a rip in the back of her black leggings. Had those legs ever been exposed to the sun? She’d sheared her blond hair since her visit last summer, which, when combined with her bony frame, gave off a chemotherapy vibe. “Better hurry up. Grandma’s waiting.” Though one year younger than me, Realm always acted as if she had seniority in our summer-only relationship. “Unless you’re too depressed to eat.”
    “I’m not depressed.”
    Mrs. Bobot’s apartment was on the top floor, right above ours. Homespun Magazine could have photographed all their issues in Mrs. Bobot’s place. There wasn’t a craft project she hadn’t tried. She’d embroidered pillows and crocheted blankets, she’d jeweled light fixtures and soldered stained glass lamps. Her homemade lace doilies had held some sort of lovefest because they covered everything, including the toilet seat.
    On that night, the scent of sautéed onions filled the apartment, along with pipe tobacco. Though Mr. Bobot had been dead for a very long time, from lung cancer, Mrs. Bobot still burned his pipe to keep the place alive with his fragrance. I really liked the woodsy scent.
    Mrs. Bobot stood at her stove, her long gray braid swaying as she stirred a simmering pot. Her air conditioner droned in the corner. “Hello, dear,” she said. “How did the event go? Did you get a good turnout? You probably did, your mother’s so popular.”
    While Mrs. Bobot had long watched over me, she now did so like a mother lion. She bought vitamins and made sure there was always fresh fruit on the counter. She trimmed my hair, took me to the movies, and even sat me down for a very detailed, very honest, very embarrassing sex talk. My real grandparents were long gone, victims of a chartered airplane crash. There were some second cousins, somewhere, but since my biological father had disappeared off the face of the earth, I had no other family. Mrs. Bobot became the grandmother upstairs.
    “While you were gone, I managed to wash all my floors and I made two dozen raisin cookies for William. He loves my cookies. And I found a renter for the fourth unit. She owns a beauty parlor and has offered to give us free makeovers. Won’t that be fun? And now