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just go on living with Hall and Nell? Or maybe go stay with Granny and Uncle Paulie? Oh, Troo would just despise that. She avoided Uncle Paulie whenever she could. When I asked her why, she said, “Cooties.” I suspected it was more than that, but never did ask her again since I did not wish to have Troo’s volcano mad erupting all over me. Besides, Granny’s house was too small, and she was in a bad way money-wise. Everybody in the neighborhood knew that.
    “If she dies, what’ll we do?” Troo kicked at the rock and it flew past me. “Do you think we’d have to go live at the orphanage?”
    Every year around Christmas our Brownie troop would go to the orphanage up on Lisbon Street called St. Jude’s, who was the patron saint of lost causes. That was a very mean thing to call your orphanage and musta made those poor orphans feel really hopeless. We would sing “What Child Is This?” and give them presents like holy cards wrapped in green tissue paper and red ribbons, and I hated it. I just couldn’t stand looking at those kids who didn’t have fathers or mothers or anybody else who gave one hoot about them. And that made me say, “No. We won’t ever have to go live in that orphanage. I promise.”
    Troo had stopped in front of the Piaskowskis’. The yard was all weedy and the house looked like it was shedding and a concrete statue of Jesus was laying on its side next to the porch like it was taking a nap. Nobody ever saw much of Mr. or Mrs. Piaskowski after Junie’s funeral.
    “That would be just about one of the worst things that could ever happen to you, gettin’ murdered like that,” Troo said. We held our breaths when we walked past and didn’t talk much for the rest of the way, but I was thinking that maybe there were some other things that could be worse.
    After mass half the neighborhood was standing out on the church lawn and I heard Mrs. Callahan, who was still Mother’s best friend and had been for a long time, say to Mrs. Latour in a very tired voice, “Helen is resting peacefully.”
    Mrs. Latour said back, “I heard that Hall has taken up with Rosie Ruggins.”
    And then Mrs. Callahan said back to her, “Helen should never have married him in the first place.” It was rude to eavesdrop, but no one would tell me if Mother was getting better and I had to find out so I could get prepared if she wasn’t. What Mrs. Callahan said, I took that to mean that Mother might be dying since she was Resting in Peace, which was what it said on Daddy’s gravestone. And what Mrs. Latour said about Hall? That probably meant that Hall was gettin’ some of the sex from Rosie Ruggins.
    When Mrs. Callahan turned and saw us, she said in a surprised voice, “Well, O’Malley sisters, hello!”
    I looked down at Mrs. Callahan’s bare legs in front of that church. She had on a little gold ankle bracelet and she wore blouses sometimes too unbuttoned. Granny told me Mother and Mrs. Callahan were crazy little she-cats when they were young, when they lived in houses next door to each other across from the cookie factory.
    Mrs. Callahan bent down and said, “Are you okay, Sally?” I tried not to cry even though my eyes were blurry because Mrs. Callahan smelled so much like Mother and I bet she had made her kids sunny-side-up eggs for breakfast. “We’re fine, Mrs. Callahan,” I said. “Hall and Nell are taking very good care of us. Mother’s gonna get better, isn’t she?”
    Mrs. Callahan said, “Well, my pa’s been real sick up at the VA Hospital so I haven’t been by to check up on Helen as much as I woulda liked, but I’m sure she’ll . . .” Then she started to cry. And I just couldn’t take that and neither could Troo because she pulled on my hand and we got lost in the crowd.

CHAPTER SEVEN
    The reason I lied to Mrs. Callahan was just in case she went up to the hospital to visit, I didn’t want her getting Mother all worked up. The truth was neither Hall nor Nell was taking very good care of