Bridget stood back and looked at the attic with a sense of accomplishment. She'd applied two coats of cream-colored paint. She'd painted the ceiling matte white and the trim semigloss. She'd painted the wide-planked floor a beautiful green, the color she remembered the Gulf of California being on sunny days last summer.

As an extra surprise for Greta, she'd set up a pretty white iron bed frame that had been in storage. She'd found a reasonable mattress. She'd sanded an antique bureau and painted it with the same cream-colored paint she'd used for the trim. On a trip to Wal-Mart she'd bought cheap-but still nice-white cotton eyelet bedding and simple white lace curtains.

The final touch was a big armful of purple hydrangeas she'd gathered in the backyard while Greta was out. She found a gla.s.s pitcher and set them on the bureau on a piece of blue fabric.

Other than the one box left in the corner of the room, it was perfect.

She thundered downstairs. "Greta! Hey!"

Greta was vacuuming. She hit the Power b.u.t.ton with her foot. "What is it, hon?"

"You ready?" Bridget asked, making no effort to hide her excitement.

"For what?" said Greta, playing coy.

"You want to see your attic?"

"Are you finished already?" Greta asked that like wasn't Bridget the cleverest girl in the whole world.

"I'll follow," Bridget ordered.

Grandma took the two flights slowly. Bridget noticed the cottage-cheesy texture under her skin and the stringy purple veins that spread over her calves.

"Ta-da," Bridget crowed, leaning past Greta to open the door at the top of the stairs with a flourish.

Grandma gasped. As if she were in a movie, she threw her hand over her wide-open mouth. She studied the room for a long time, every single part. "Oh, honey," she said. When she turned around, Bridget could see there were tears in her eyes. "It is so beautiful."

Bridget couldn't ever remember feeling as proud. "It looks good, doesn't it?"

"You made a little home up here, didn't you?"

Bridget nodded. Without thinking about it quite like that, she really had.

Greta smiled. "I didn't peg you for the domestic type, I'll admit."

"Me either!" Bridget answered, her eyebrows high on her forehead. "You should see my room at home." She got quiet. She hadn't meant to bring up anything about home.

Grandma let it go. "You worked your tail off on this job, honey, and I am so grateful to you."

Bridget shuffled modestly. "No problem."

"And I already have somebody in mind to move in."

Bridget's face fell, and she didn't try to hide it. She hadn't actually imagined somebody moving in here and throwing her out. Was Greta all done with her? Was there no more work for her here? Was this really it?

"You do?" she said, trying not to cry.

"Yes. You."

"Me?"

Grandma laughed. "Of course. You'd rather be here than in that falling-down boardinghouse on Royal Street, wouldn't you?"

"Yes," Bridget said, her heart lifting high.

"So it's done. Go get your bags."

Carmen discovered a strange scene when she walked into her kitchen the next morning. Her mother and her father's stepdaughter were sitting across from each other at the small round table, chewing companionably on poached eggs.

"Morning," Carmen said groggily. She'd been half hoping she'd dreamed the whole Krista episode.

"Would you like a poached egg?" Christina asked.

Carmen shook her head. "I hate poached eggs."

Krista ceased chewing the very bite in her mouth. She had a look of yearning on her face, as if she wished it were she who had thought to hate poached eggs.

Carmen backed up in a hurry. "I don't hate them, actually. I like them, actually. Brain food. I'm just not in the mood for them." It was a tricky business, being somebody's role model. It was a lot of pressure, especially in the morning.

"Are you baby-sitting today?" Christina asked her.

Carmen got out the sweet Cheerios and a bowl. "Nuh-uh. The Morgans left for Rehoboth yesterday afternoon. I don't work again till Tuesday."

Her mother nodded vaguely. Christina hadn't appeared to listen to her own question, let alone Carmen's answer.

Christina got up to pour more coffee, and Carmen took sudden note of the skirt she was wearing. It had gray and white pleats, and her mother had owned it since before Carmen was in nursery school. There were first-string outfits and there were second-string outfits, but this skirt belonged on the bench. Forever.

"Are you wearing that to work?" Carmen asked, forgetting to hide her disbelief. How long had it been since either of them had done laundry?

Her mother was easily hurt these days, so Carmen shouldn't have been surprised to see her disappear into her room.

A few minutes later, Carmen looked up from her cereal to see Krista gazing motionlessly at her half-eaten poached egg, and Christina wearing yesterday's pants.

It was pathetic. It was horrible. Carmen hated herself and hated them for listening to her.

"Hey, I have an idea," she said in an overloud voice to the two of them. "From now on, n.o.body listen to anything I say."

Lena lay in her bed until the middle of the next day, just her and her bursting heart, thinking about everything that had happened. She wanted to keep herself to herself, as she was often inclined to do. But she also wanted to share the news, so she was glad when the phone rang and it was Bee.

"Guess what?" Lena blurted out immediately.

"What?"

"I did know."

"You did know what?"

"I did know what I needed to do."

"About Kostos?"

"Yes. And you know what else?"

"What?"

"I did what I needed to do."

Bridget screamed. "You did?"

"I did."

"Tell me."

Lena told her everything. It was hard to give such a private, visceral experience to the spoken word, but she also had the rea.s.suring sense that she was locking it down.

Bee screamed again when she was done.

"Lenny, I am so proud of you!"

Lena smiled. "I'm proud of me too."

Tibberon: C, have you talked to Lena yet? She sounded so giggly I thought I was talking to Effie. I'm happy for her. Kind of scary, though, too. I want her to still be Lenny. One Effie is enough over there.

Carmabelle: I talked to her. It's amazing. The Love Pants are at it again. Except for me. Is there something wrong with me, Tib? I mean, besides all the regular things?

What is that you express in your eyes? It seems to me more than all the words I have read in my life.

-Walt Whitman

Sometimes you just had to face it. You had to march right into the ugly middle, Tibby told herself. Otherwise you ended up flat against the wall, creeping fearfully around the edge your whole life.

That was what she told herself, and she was sticking with it. She put the disk into her computer.

She studied the files. She couldn't remember what was what. She was a good labeler, but Bailey was not, and Bailey had been her PA and supposed organizational whiz. Then again, Bailey had been twelve. Tibby picked one and double-clicked. She had to start someplace.

An image materialized on her screen. It was her setup shot from the day at the 7-Eleven. It was from their first day of filming last summer-Tibby remembered it so distinctly. It was the day she'd met Brian.

The picture moved from the counter display of Slim Jims to the man working the register. Just as she remembered, he slapped his hands over his face, shouting, "No camera! No camera!" Tibby felt the smile on her face.

Then the shot changed and Tibby gasped. There it was. Tibby felt as though every nerve in her body were on alert. It was Bailey's face, close up. She felt the surge of emotion smack her like a sandbag across the head. Fat tears floated in front of her eyes. Without thinking, Tibby's finger hit the Pause key. The resolution diminished, but the image was even more striking. Tibby leaned in so close the tip of her nose touched the screen. She drew back. She was almost scared the face would disappear, but it didn't.

Bailey looked over her shoulder at Tibby. She was laughing. She was right there. Right there.

Tibby hadn't seen her since the last night of her life.

She had imagined Bailey's face at least a million times between then and now, but the further she got from the real Bailey, the less distinct it became. She was glad for the real face again, for Bailey's eyes.

Beethoven was rollicking along. Bailey was laughing.

Tibby let the feelings wash over her. She could sit here and cry for as long as she liked. She could crawl under the desk. She could run around in the parking lot. She could live big. She could make herself to do things that were hard. She could.

For once, Tibby was right smack in the middle, and she could see a lot better from here.

Her mother was at work and Krista was asleep and the Morgans were at the beach and Bee was in Alabama and Lena was at the store and Tibby was in Virginia and Carmen was sitting in her closet.

Her closet was so full of c.r.a.p it was a walk-in in name only. Carmen loved shopping, but she hated throwing anything away. She loved beginnings, but she hated endings. She loved order, but she hated cleaning.

Most of all, she loved dolls. She had a collection that could only belong to a solitary female child of guilt-ridden parents.

She loved dolls, but she wasn't good at taking care of them, she decided as she pulled out the three cardboard boxes of them that lived under her hanging clothes. Throughout her childhood they had been dear to her. She had played with them long after normal girls had stopped. But her efforts at washing and grooming and dressing and improving them, her many eager makeovers, had left them looking like veterans of a long and grueling war.