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Kathy tucks Egg into bed. With a snap of the wrist, Kathy floats the sheet down the length of the bed and draws the edge under Egg’s chin.
    Egg laughs. “You’re like a magician.”
    Kathy scoops the moufu, the heavy blanket, from the foot of the bed and plops it down on Egg’s head. It is like an old game of avalanche.
    Egg’s head pops from beneath the blanket. “You going out with Stacey tonight?”
    â€œYeah. What about it?” Kathy, straightening out the corners of the bed, has her prickles up.
    Egg sighs. She knows that her sister will keep her secrets until the day she dies but they are written all over her face. “Nothing…Could you tell me a story?”
    â€œEgg —”
    â€œA short one. Promise not to interrupt.” Egg crosses her heart. “Hope to die.”
    Kathy puffs out her cheeks.
    â€œOr I can tell you about the Vast Open Plains of the Northern—”
    â€œOkay, okay,” Kathy rubs her chin, “give me a sec.”
    Egg sits and draws the blanket around her. “Is Papa ever coming out of the ostrich barn?”
    â€œI don’t know.”
    â€œKathy?”
    â€œYeah?” Kathy’s hand pats the bottom of the bed for Nekoneko, Egg’s puppet Kitty. Egg can’t sleep without Nekoneko.
    â€œHow did you get Popular?”
    â€œWell, I don’t know that I’m Popular.”
    â€œNo one teases you, and I’ve seen you stand up for Raymond.”
    â€œIs that what this is about? Is someone teasing you? Is it Martin?”
    Egg sinks a little. “No.” She worries the corner of the moufu. “I just wish things were different.”
    Kathy pulls out Nekoneko from beneath the bed and knocks off the dust. “Yeah,” she says softly.
    Humpty Dumpty, Egg thinks.
    â€œIt’s time for you to go to sleep.” Kathy raises her hand to the lamp but her eyes fall to the book on the bedside table. “Hey,” she says as she picks up the worn paperback of Anne Frank: Diary of a Young Girl . “If you want me to read this to you, don’t read ahead, okay?” She squints at Egg. “Have you been going through my room again?”
    Egg hugs the book to her chest. “I just like to hold it. Let me keep it, please — I won’t read ahead, I promise. I just like to look at her picture.” Egg rubs the outline of Anne’s photograph at the back of the book and thinks of her own notebook. It’s the first day of school and her pages are blank but she is too tired and enough is enough. Egg rolls onto her back and sighs. “I would like a best friend, Kathy.”
    Kathy turns off the lamp.
    Egg tosses dramatically. “I can’t sleep.”
    Kathy strokes Egg’s head, her fingers threading through her thick, stubborn hair. She whispers, “Just think of all the alphabet animals.”
    Egg closes her eyes. The first day of school. The first September without Albert. She thinks of Mama and retreats into her blanket. “Do you think we’re broken?”
    â€œShh, Egg. Shh.”
    Egg feels the lulling motion of Kathy’s hand stroking her hair, hears the rhythm of Kathy’s breathing. Through her window, she can see the swirl of constellations. She thinks of the big blue whale, a pod of leaping dolphins — and Raymond— she smiles. If penguin Raymond can make it through school, maybe Egghead ostriches can too.
    She sleeps.
    â€¦
    Egg opens her eyes. The moonlight falls through her window. The curtains waver, stirred by the faintest draft in this quiet, quiet dark.
    Quiet. But no. That sound.
    Egg sits up.
    She hears a cry from down the hall. Mama’s room. Egg darts to her door, the shock of the cold floor on her bare feet making her run faster and faster, a tiptoe mouse scurry to the bedroom down the hall. She pauses at her Mama’s door and peeks through the crack.
    Mama slumps by the side of the bed, her back to Egg.