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impossible to ignore.
    Miranda tried to do her biology homework, but she couldn't concentrate. So she fished a thick library book out of her backpack and settled herself in the window seat to read until her parents came home. Helen worked until nearly seven every Friday, going over to the hospital at the end of her normal office hours to visit patients and check lab results. Because of the continuing snowfall, she had left her car in the garage today and taken the bus into town. Philip was in Lexington and would pick Helen up at the hospital on his way home.
    Miranda liked the silence and peace of the big house. She watched the patterns of late-afternoon light filter across the pages of her book, remembering all too well how elusive that sense of peace had been when her family lived in their cramped New York apartment. There she had tripped over piles of books and papers in the tiny living room to get back to the even tinier alcove that had been her bedroom. Even there it had been hard to have any real privacy, since the walls were so thin she could hear her parents' conversations almost as well as if she were sitting on the couch with them. But here in her big corner bedroom, she had space for all her things, privacy for all her thoughts. And the sounds of the house were muffled. Miranda stretched on the window seat, watching the snow falling outside her window. Snowing again! She had never known such a white winter before.
    Deep in her book, Miranda did not immediately register the thud of the closing front door. But then she marked her page, shut the book, and hurried down the stairs to greet her mother and father and ask about going to Dan's for dinner. "Dad!" She hugged him there in the front hall and unwound his scarf. "You look like a snowman. Where's Mither?"
    Then she noticed his grim face and angry frown. "In the kitchen," he said briefly and steered her in that direction.
    Puzzled, Miranda pushed through the swinging door, then stopped so fast that her father could not enter from the other side. "Abby!"
    Abby stood next to the kitchen table. Her face was as colorless as the winter sky. Her mouth looked pinched, her eyes were wide and staring.
    She looks frightened,
thought Miranda in surprise.
More than that—she looks terrified.
    Helen was by the sink, shrugging off her coat. When she spoke, her voice was as icy as the weather outside. "I suggest you take off your coat, too, Abby. We need to talk before you can go home."
    Abby set her beaded bag on the floor. Then she slowly removed her dirty beige coat and stood holding it. Philip went out the back door and returned in a moment carrying two heavy bags of groceries. "There's another one on the step," he told Miranda, and she opened the back door and hurried to help.
    "Okay," said Philip when Miranda set the bag on the table. "Now we talk."
    Miranda raised her brows, mystified. What in the world was going on here? She pulled out a chair and sat down at the table.
    Abby stood silently, head bowed, as Philip took her coat from her arms and put it on the counter. Helen began unpacking the food from the bags, stowing vegetables in the refrigerator with short, angry movements.
    Philip drummed on the table with his fingers. "Can't the groceries wait, Helen?"
    Helen shrugged but came over to the table. She sat down and indicated a chair for Abby. Abby sat down slowly and slumped over the table, looking whiter and thinner than Miranda thought possible. For a long moment no one said anything. Both Helen and Philip seemed to be waiting for Abby to speak. But the girl just sat staring at her hands in her lap.
    "Would anyone like hot chocolate or something?" asked Miranda to break the silence.
    She was stalling, but she was suddenly afraid to hear what was wrong.
    "Okay," said her father, surprising her with his unusually gruff tone. "Make us all some."
    Miranda left the table and busied herself heating water in the microwave and spooning the cocoa mix into mugs. Philip