I woke up six hours later, and my mouth tasted like an overturned dumpster. I turned over and moaned; each breath tasted rank. My tongue traveled the roof of my mouth. It was dry, sticky, and filmed over.

Those two beers from nine and seven hours ago had come back in full force. Sometime during the night, my taste buds had declared: Yes. Beer. Excellent. From now on, that is what we will taste like.

I groggily poked my alarm clock into submission and allowed myself to lay for a while, drifting gradually through that viscous place between asleep and awake. I somehow had escaped being grounded. And I somehow had a whole conversation with my mom about the divorce without either of us spitefully mentioning Peter. The circle had tightened in without him. I wondered if the same thing would happen to Dad.

And... we'd talked about... that.

I shivered, thinking about her unnerving, vacant expression, and thinking about my Dad, wherever he was, clueless to the strange minds of his daughter and wife. Ex-wife.

I'd never really even thought about whether he deserved to know. Whether I had the right to tell him.

I couldn't think about this now. My brain was still sleepy. I yawned, exhaling a cloud of filth that made my eyes water. Something tickled my neck.

A spider, obviously, said sleepy brain. And then, holy shit, spider!

I swatted at the spider and it swatted back, because it wasn't a spider. The tangle of beads settled back down, brushing my skin. My mom's earrings restored their natural tangibility sometime during my sleep, when I'd been too unconscious to maintain the illusion.

I wasn't sure if she'd be more upset to hear that I'd worn her nice earrings to the party, or that I'd worn them to bed. Neither would hold a candle to how upset she would be if she found out that, at one point, I'd plucked the earrings out of her brain to keep her neck from feeling tickled as we hugged.

I hated lying to my mom less than I hated being grounded.

Okay. School.

Pants went on. Socks. I rifled around in my closet for the T-Shirt I had in mind. Found it. Tried forcing my head through a shirt sleeve, rotated it, and put the shirt on properly. I dropped the earrings in my jeans pocket with a plan to discreetly return them to my mom's jewelry cabinet.

I scrubbed at the layer of film on my tongue and caught up on a few texts. One from Navid asking if I'd gotten in without getting grounded. One from my Aunt Stella, back from a trip to Greece and asking to catch up. Mom wouldn't like that. Some sixteen from Melanie, sent at various points throughout the party, before we retreated to her room to wallow.

I checked on Peter.

I knew better than to expect much. I hadn't heard from him since that last haunting text seven months ago on the night he disappeared.

I wondered when Mom would finally give up and stop paying for his phone line. The fact she hadn't made me believe she was holding out hope that he would show up on the doorstep, like he did when he was ten years old and decided to run away in the heat of a tantrum. I was the one who found him in a small shack by the bike path. He came back when I told him we were having pizza rolls.

I scrolled up to the last message he'd sent me. May 16th. 12:17 am.

She wanted this. You have to believe me. It was her choice.

Chills, every time. I'd sent him some sixty messages over the last year, just checking in. Asking how he was doing. At first, I had hoped he would respond. Now I knew better.

We're having pizza rolls tonight, I texted.

I put the phone back in my pocket and everything was normal.

The school guidance counselor advised that I stop with the texting. I don't know why I didn't. Maybe I thought that, even if he wasn't replying to my messages, there was a possibility he was at least reading them. Maybe it felt like everyone else had given up on him. I wanted to let him know that I hadn't.

Not twenty seconds later, my pocket buzzed. I jumped and felt that familiar sting of hope.

Over in ten.

Melanie, coming to pick me up for school. I dejectedly put my phone away. It was frustrating to be reminded that a part of me still foolishly hoped.

I could hear Mom clacking away at her keyboard upstairs. Colin's room was quiet when I passed. I paddled a beat on his door with both hands to make sure he was up, and because I knew it annoyed him.

My mom's desk came into view as I bounded up the stairs. Her eyes had that familiar up-since-four-am glaze, but she still managed to look put-together. Her desk was the usual scene of organized chaos, stacked files and sticky notes orchestrating her day. She managed them deftly, filing old tasks away with her left hand, writing new ones with her right.

"How'd you sleep?" I asked.

She blinked blearily and turned her head to me. A little earpiece was tucked into her hair.

"Alex, I'm on the phone."

"Oh. Sorry."

I turned on the kettle and scoured the pantry for oatmeal. I portioned it out into two bowls as Colin came up the stairs. He was newly thirteen and just growing into his attitude. He wore his backpack over one shoulder and walked with a silly, loping swagger. He ignored us on his way out the door.

"When are you coming home?" I heard Mom ask into her headset. I was caught off guard by another unpredictable nostalgic sting. I knew she must be talking to a coworker at the hospital or a fellow PTA member, but it was so easy to fill in the blank at the other end of the line with a picture of my Dad, off speaking at some convention somewhere.

Maybe it was the way she said it that reminded me of Dad. It was such a practical "when are you home." You could hear the logistics.

"Alex? Are you listening to me?"

"What?"

"When are you coming home?"

"Oh. I thought you were on the phone."

She gave me a look, an I am infathomably older than you, your comments are trivial in a way you can't possibly understand look. "Why would I be asking my client when she's home?"

"I don't know, and I'll be home... not sure. Aunt Stella wants to see me."

Her face dulled to a muted calm. Only someone who knew her could possibly recognize it as "frustration."

My mom disliked many things. She disliked cream in her coffee. She disliked drivers who failed to yield the merge. She disliked me talking about our powers, she disliked me calling our powers "powers," and she disliked her younger sister.

She was convinced my Aunt was trying to turn me to the dark side. In all fairness, she was.

"No," she said plainly, "you're grounded."

"What?"

"You missed your curfew. I thought we were clear after last time. Midnight. Sharp."

Outside, Melanie double tapped her adorable horn. It was the politest horn I'd ever heard. Excuse me, may I trouble you?

I didn't move, even as Mom turned back around in her seat, fiddling with her headseat. We'd had a nice talk last night. I thought we were going to overlook things. We'd sealed the deal with a hug, dang it. Did the hug mean nothing?

"When am I done being grounded?"

She didn't reply. Melanie's horn sounded again. She used the horn more than any other feature in the car, windshield wipers, turn signal, and brake included.

"Mom?"

She turned around and frowned at me, pointed to her headset, then started speaking to someone on the other line.

I scowled. Holding an oatmeal in either hand, I wrangled the front door open with my foot.

When Melanie saw me, she honked a few more times, just for fun.