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  A moment later Dad and Ben came in, but there was still no Mom.

  “Is she coming down?” I asked.

  “She says she’s too tired. I tried,” said Dad.

  “Will it work if she doesn’t?” Caitlin asked.

  “I was afraid this might happen,” I said, “so I texted Grace yesterday. She said as long as we’re all in the same house, it ought to work. Is everybody ready? First we burn the money.”

  “Is that a good idea?” Dad asked.

  “We have adult supervision,” I said.

  “You mean me,” Dad said.

  “Get a glass of water,” I told Ben.

  “Bossy,” said Ben.

  “Please,” I said.

  Ben turned around and went for water.

  “We should turn out the lights,” said Julia.

  “Who put you in charge?” said Caitlin.

  “Hello-o-o? I wrote the report!” said Julia.

  “In second grade,” muttered Caitlin.

  Ben came back with the water. Julia turned out the lights. The room turned shadowy-gloomy but not entirely dark. Carefully, I struck a match and touched the flame to a Monopoly dollar. Its corner turned black, then curled. I was afraid it might wilt instead of burning, then—poof—the scraps blazed brilliant yellow before fading in a moment to sorrowful smoke and ash.

  A poetical person like Lucy would have seen the burst of light and thought how our lives on earth are short. I saw it and worried the fire might leave a spot on the plate.

  “Now do we say words or something?” Caitlin asked.

  “We should say words in Chinese,” Ben said.

  “I can say ‘hello’ and ‘thank you’ in both Cantonese and Mandarin,” said Julia.

  “Those aren’t the words we want,” I said. “I didn’t find anything good online, but what matters is that we remember GG. And all the other ghosts too. In the afterlife—in heaven—we wish you every comfort.”

  “And cookies!” said Benjamin.

  “And cookies!” said Dad and Caitlin and Julia.

  In my imagination I saw GG as clearly as if she were in the room with us. She was clapping her hands and smiling her awesome smile. After that I seemed to hear her voice: “All this for one old lady? Boy, did I ever luck out in the family department!”

  Ben said, “It’s not only for you. It’s for Nathan, too.”

  Wait. Who was Ben talking to? I looked over at him. “What did you—”

  “Nothing,” Ben said quickly. “Nobody.” But his eyes were wide like he’d seen a you-know-what. Had something strange just happened?

  “Who’s Nathan?” Caitlin asked, and then she must’ve remembered because she said, “Oh!” and “Sorry,” and covered her mouth with her hand.

  “It’s okay, Caitlin,” my dad said. “Ben and Emma’s brother died before you were born.”

  I was still trying to figure out Ben’s comment when I heard a noise upstairs. Was it a ghost? And then the doorbell rang.

  Ben said, “I’ll get it.” He left the room and returned a minute later. Behind him was Grandma.

  “What are you doing here?” I asked. Then I realized how that sounded and added, “Uh, great to see you.”

  Grandma said, “I was in the neighborhood.” Then she surveyed the room, inhaled some incense, and wrinkled her nose. “What’s going on here exactly? What’s that I smell? Emma, your brother said you would explain.”

  Julia spoke before I had the chance. “We’re appeasing hungry ghosts.”

  “Nice word usage,” said Dad.

  Grandma shook her head. “Do you mean Halloween? Isn’t it early for that? What’s that you’re wearing, Emma? Is this some kind of a slumber party?”

  “That’s a lot of questions,” said Ben.

  “I have a few myself.” Mom appeared in the doorway behind them. She looked, I have to say, kind of witchy. Her wild gray hair had not calmed down since Sunday. She wore a black bathrobe and her pj’s.

  “Why don’t we sort this out over pizza?” Dad said. “I may not be a ghost, but I am hungry.”

  It took about five minutes to move the ceremony stuff to the sideboard and bring in pizza, plates, napkins, and glasses from the kitchen. We sat around one end of the big, formal table, with Grandma at the head. With a lot of help from Julia, I explained. I left out the part about GG haunting my mom. I just said the ceremony was Chinese and for GG, and besides, we had run out of cookies so I baked some.

  “It all sounds, if you’ll forgive me, quite preposterous,” said Grandma, who was taking delicate bites of pizza, cut with knife and fork.

  “That’s why we didn’t tell you,” Ben said. He was chewing as he spoke.

  “Ben!” I said.

  “What?” He swallowed. “It doesn’t mean we don’t love her.”

  Someone giggled. I looked around and I saw that it was Mom. “Sorry,” she said. “Of course we love you, Mother.”

  “Are you feeling better, dear?” my grandmother asked her. “Do you think perhaps you’ll be able to return to your usual schedule tomorrow?”

  “No need to if you’re not up to it,” my dad said quickly. I think he was annoyed with Grandma.

  My mother said, “I’m still pretty tired,” and then changed the subject. “Did anyone see any ghosts?”

  “Not me,” said Caitlin, “unfortunately.” And all of us shook our heads—Benjamin too.

  “We don’t really believe in them,” I said.

  “They’re supposed to be cranky,” said Caitlin, “irritable, I mean.”

  “I bet they’re lonely,” Mom said. “I bet they’re afraid they’ll be forgotten. I bet they miss what they’ve left behind.”

  “Do you believe in ghosts, Mom?” Ben asked.

  “Not the spooky kind that float around making trouble,” Mom said, “but there are ghosts that live in our minds, the memories of loved ones who died.”

  I said, “Like Nathan,” and instantly felt bad. The words had just popped out.

  Mom didn’t seem to mind, though. In fact, she looked better—more awake and more herself—than she had in a while. “I miss him every day,” she said.

  “Me too,” Dad said. “He’d be twenty-one now. He’d probably be in college.”

  “He would like having a little brother,” said Ben.

  “And a little sister,” I said.

  “I bet he’s with GG,” said Ben. “They’re keeping each other company.”

  My dad said that was a nice thought, and my mom reached over and squeezed Ben’s shoulder. Then my grandmother did something that for her was shocking: My grandmother started to cry!

  Her tears threw us all into a tizzy. My mom got up for tissues. My dad got up for a glass of water. Caitlin just stared until Julia kicked her, and then they both got up to clear the table.

  Ben and I helped.

  Once the tears were over, the apologies began—first my grandmother for her tears and then Ben for making her cry.

  “You didn’t do anything wrong,” Grandma reassured him. “It was a nice thought—the two of them together. I can’t think why it set me off like that.”

  “I think I know,” Mom said. “You’ve tried to postpone being sad, same as I did. In the end, though, it turns out the ghosts won’t let you get away with it.”

  “Like mother, like daughter,” my grandmother said.

  “Could be,” said my mother. “And now do you know what we need?”

  “Cookies?” I suggested.

  “Exactly right,” said my mother. “We’ve given the ghosts a fair chance to eat them. What they’ve left must be for the rest of us.”

  We were back in the dining room by this time, sitting around the table again. I pushed my chair back and went over to the sideboard. The bud vase was there with the burned incense sticks. The china salad plate was there with the ashy remains of Monopoly money. The china dinner plate was there too . . . and it was empty. The thumbprint cookies had disappeared.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
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br />   Monday, January 15, Olivia

  I love love, love, love, love Christmas, and in our family, it’s a very big deal.

  Too big, according to Jenny and Ralph, who tsk-tsk and shake their heads every time the subject comes up.

  Jenny and Ralph—if you’re wondering—live with my family in an apartment downstairs in our house. Since before I was born, their job has been to help take care of us. My parents value Jenny and Ralph’s opinion, and every year right after Thanksgiving they agree that Jenny and Ralph are entirely right and they will turn down the volume because the last thing this family needs is more stuff.

  Jenny nods approvingly when my parents say this. Ralph winks and gives them a big thumbs-up.

  Then my parents go right out and buy as much as they did the year before, and they have all of it wrapped and placed under the tall and super-ginormous tree the gardener sets up in the living room.

  Not that I’m complaining. I happen to like all the silver-gold-twinkly Christmas decorations, not to mention the prezzies—especially the ones marked FOR OLIVIA, FROM SANTA because they don’t require thank-you notes.

  Secretly, I think Jenny and Ralph must like Christmas too. For example, Ralph gets to spend a whole day with Jenny by the tree while she gives him the very best advice on precisely where every light and ornament ought to go. Then he gets to spend two whole days hanging lights outside and several hours hanging wreaths and garlands and other decorations on banisters and over doorways throughout the house.

  Meanwhile, Jenny makes about a million Christmas cookies for my parents to give away to the people who work at our family’s business, Baron Barbecue Sauce. Maybe you’ve heard of it. Maybe you have a bottle in your refrigerator right now. If you do, you can go take a look at my parents; that’s their picture on the label. Sometimes I think this is embarrassing, and sometimes I think at least we don’t make dog food.

  Being eleven years old, I have seen my fair share of Christmases, and I know a thing or two about the way they come and go. The going part—the so very, very sad, sad, sad, sad part—happens in stages. First the boxes and wrapping paper are recycled, second the presents are put away, and third the leftovers are eaten.

  This year the final stages happened over the weekend. On Saturday, the gardener wrestled the tree out of the house—leaving needles everywhere—then he hauled it away to be chipped into mulch. Jenny, meanwhile, vacuumed. After that, she and I packed the ornaments back in their boxes and the boxes back in their storage room on the third floor.

  I helped even though I didn’t have to and even without being asked because I am a good and generous young person and also because of the little incident in the kitchen on Friday when, while demonstrating a perfect handstand, I miscalculated my left foot’s return to the floor, kicked the kitchen table (ow!), and broke Jenny’s favorite teacup.

  “Sorry,” I said, rubbing my poor, sad, bruised toes.

  Jenny placed her hands on her hips and stared down at the pieces.

  “What if you look on the bright side?” I tried. “Now I know what to get you for your birthday.”

  “The teacup was my mother’s,” Jenny said. Then she raised her face and looked at me with narrowed eyes.

  “Really, really very, very, very sorry,” I said.

  “And?” said Jenny.

  “And . . . uh, I’ll sweep that up for you?” I said.

  “You do that, please,” said Jenny.

  “Right away,” I said, and then I did, and then I helped with the ornaments, too.

  On Monday, with Christmas well and truly gone, Hannah’s utterly scrumptious lemon cookies arrived to make me feel better. You might consider this ironic—which means an upside-down coincidence—because Hannah is Jewish and doesn’t even celebrate Christmas. I, instead, considered it further evidence that the universe is on my side and wants to help me get through even the darkest days.

  What can I say? I am lucky like that is all.

  After school that day I had come up the steps to the front door and seen that the wreath was gone and felt a stabbing sadness in my heart: Christmas was over! How would I survive the long, dark, lonely winter?

  In the living room, I took a picture of the bare space where the tree had been and posted it with an emoji of a crying polar bear wearing a Santa hat. Then I hopscotched across the black-and-white marble squares in the foyer and walked through the dining room to the kitchen to find Jenny and see what there was for snack. Right there on the counter was the box addressed to me, Olivia Baron, in Kansas City, MO. The return address was Floral Park, NY.

  I knew right away what was in that box: cookies from Hannah!

  (She is my only friend in Floral Park.)

  Jenny was busy with bowls and knives and vegetables—organizing dinner. She said hello and asked me something about the box. To be honest, I wasn’t totally listening. My friend Dominique had sent me an Instagram of a slice of pizza that was purple, and I was trying to figure out if it was beets or a filter or what, and besides that the likes had started to come in for my polar-bear-Christmas post—twelve so far.

  “Olivia!” Jenny said. “Hello?”

  “Hello, Jenny,” I said. “How are you this sad, sad afternoon? At least”—I sighed sorrowfully—“there are cookies to provide solace. May I have a knife?”

  “I’ll open the box for you, sweetheart,” Jenny said. “Cookies, is it? Now, who are they from again?”

  I started to tell her about Hannah, my counselor for two summers at Moonlight Ranch, and about the Secret Cookie Club, but my phone kept buzzing with likes, and Dominique was posting more rainbow pictures of pizza. What was up with that, anyway?

  “Olivia?” Jenny said.

  “Oh, you opened the box. Thank you,” I said. The kitchen had filled with the summery sweet smell of lemonade. “Yum—have a cookie, Jenny. May I have a glass of milk? Hey, look at this. I wouldn’t eat pink pizza, would you?”

  “Probably not,” said Jenny, “and I’ll pass on the cookies, too, even though they do smell wonderful.” She patted her tummy as if she were fat, which she isn’t. “Now, look here, there’s a letter in the box. Here you go, Olivia. Olivia?”

  “Unh-hunh,” I said. Esmee Snyder had just posted that video of the cat and the mirror—I mean, who hasn’t seen that one at least a thousand times?

  “Olivia!” Jenny said again.

  “Unh-hunh,” I said. “Oh—thanks for the milk. These cookies are delicious. You should have some. Hannah made them. Did I say that already?”

  Jenny sighed and shook her head. “Talking to you is a misery, Olivia. You know that, right?”

  “No, I don’t,” I said, “and furthermore”—I clapped my hand to my chest—“I am mortally wounded that you hold that opinion. OMG, Richard, the cute boy from math, hearted my taco-chip post from lunch. I think I might be in love!”

  Jenny sighed. “That’s nice. I think I might make dinner.”

  I looked up from my phone. “Wait,” I said. “Don’t you want to know about school? And I was going to tell you about Hannah and the cookie club, too—or did I already?”

  I had always thought of Jenny as a very patient person, but that afternoon she got a little snippy, which is Mom language for not cranky yet but definitely on that road.

  “Maybe you could put your phone down for a few moments, and we’ll talk,” Jenny said.

  “Sure,” I said, “of course,” and I was about to, except first I had to post a picture of Hannah’s cookies, and then I thought I better take another one of me eating Hannah’s cookies, but the lighting was bad and my nose looked shiny. So I had to fix that and add some blue hair highlights too.

  I tried to show Jenny the photo after I posted it, but she was peeling carrots and barely paid attention. “I prefer the real you to the you on a screen,” she said. Now, what was that supposed to mean?

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Olivia

  After snack, I took Hannah’s letter upstairs to my room and made myself comfor
table among the pillows, power cords, and stuffed animals on my bed. I opened the envelope with my name on it and pulled out one sheet of paper. Hannah hadn’t written much, I noticed.

  I checked my phone one more time. The polar-bear-Christmas picture had fifty-two likes and six comments, none of them from Richard.

  He hadn’t liked the cookie pictures, either.

  Obviously, something was wrong with me. Since when was I unpopular? Since when was I unloved?

  I inhaled deeply for strength. Then I started to read.

  Thursday, January 11

  Hey there, Olivia!

  Quick note because I don’t have much time. Travis is picking me up, and we are going to the movies. It’s his turn to choose, so there will be car chases, laser weapons, guys acting gross, or all three. It turns out the patience I learned being a counselor at Moonlight Ranch comes in handy the rest of the year.

  Here the weather is freezing and I am a little bored because spring semester classes haven’t started. I am looking forward to learning more about Renaissance painting. When I was your age, I probably would have thought that sounded boring, but they make school more interesting when you’re older.

  These lemon cookies were baked this morning. My recipe is on the way to becoming world famous, if I do say so myself. My grandfather, the baker, would be proud. Travis loves it when I bake, so I am saving him a few.

  Do you remember me talking about Travis? He’s the guy I was seeing right before camp started last summer, and then we had a misunderstanding, and now—since Thanksgiving—we are back together. He goes to the same college I do, so I am super happy.

  How are you? How was your Christmas? How is your beautiful family? Is your brother playing baseball this year? I know it’s hard, but try to be patient about that. I bet secretly he appreciates having you at his games.

  Gotta go. Travis can’t stand being late to the movies. One time he turned right around and walked out!

  Happy New Year, O, and enjoy the cookies!

  Your one and only Flowerpot counselor, Hannah

  P.S. I am already getting letters about this summer from Paula in the Moonlight Ranch office. Can’t wait to see you then!