A
Andrea Zenkins is the oldest of her siblings, celebrates her birthday on New Year's Day, and wakes up before sunrise, every day, because there's always dirty dishes in the sink and she wants to clear them out before breakfast. Being first is her birthright. Being first is a choice. She reminds herself this, that some things are her own choice, taken and not given. She is careful to not hate her siblings.
So let's tell the story of an eldest daughter, this sun-browned, honey-haired girl, sworn by her siblings as the most beautiful person in the world. Tell the story of a girl with a garden that must love her back, because it offers up vegetables sweeter than any groceries. And she certainly wasn't born with a green thumb—her siblings can attest to the history of her early floral victims—but boy, the eldest Zenkins might be the most stubborn of her siblings. She's got to be; whenever her mother is gone, she has to handle them.
They adore her, you know. They follow her like sunflowers. And one day she won't be the tallest, as is the fate of every older sibling, but for now she stands a good head taller than Bastian and nearly twice Dante's height. For now she can hoist them onto her back, claim it's easier than picking up a bag of feathers—for now she teaches them to feel safe, how could they not, with big sister right there? For now. For now. One day they'll hear the creak in her spine, see the strain around her eyes, tell her to put them down already, they're bigger now, they can keep themselves safe. Andrea has spent her whole life looking after them, but one day they'll realize they can look after her too. Funny, isn't it?
So let's go back in time, let's tell a story: Andrea is still an only child, the first time her mother takes her down to the sea. In less than a week, she'll be an older sister, but for now, she curls up into her mother's side, ear pressed to the swollen belly, solemnly listening for the gentle thump-thump-thump of the unborn creature she'll have to take care of. Back in the present, back to the story: Andrea remembers herself by the hands buried in the dry soil, barren gravel turned into a garden by the work of torn palms, broken shovels, stubborn devotion to the pale, hardy shoots that took months to coax into blossom. She still doesn't think it's finished. She never thinks anything is really finished. Last year, Andrea planted creeping thyme and wintergreen, and every breath stings the back of her throat. Inhale, exhale. It shouldn't be this hard to be alive.
Stand up, eldest daughter; the children are waiting for you inside. They are a good life, Andrea thinks, they always have been. They are the only life she has ever wanted.
She goes back home.
B
Bastian Zenkins is the second child and the oldest son, and he was never meant to be a big brother. He's not good at it, he tells his older sister, to which she'll roll her eyes, brush her knuckles over the top of his head: Sure, but you still have to be.
And, well, his sister's right. She always is.
So tell the story of Bastian, who's the one who talks his little siblings out of trouble, who teaches himself magic tricks to make them laugh—a deck of cards stacked faster than a blink, coins folded between fingers, scarves pulled out of an ear. He's no good at being a brother, but he's good at convincing people that everything's going to be okay, he's here, he's got you. He's very good at lying, that Bastian. He is used to being believed. And when his younger sister and brother cling to every word he says, that's not because of him, it's because of them, because his sister is full of words and his brother is full of music and even Bastian is not so terrible enough as to ignore them.
Tell the story of a boy who is too young to be trusted, too old to be naive; tell the story of a middle child who picks his family over the world every single time. His mother's son to the end. Of course he is, anyone can tell, with those eyes of his—his mother's eyes, the brightest blue, and yes, they're blue, not gray or green or hazel but a clear turquoise that's impossible to mistake for anything less. Ziah Zenkins's eyes. Ziah Zenkins's face. Tell the story of a son's clever hands, just like his mother; think back to childhood and remembered pale fingers folded between his, guiding a knife to peel rind from fruit, pluck a pit out of flesh, turn the knife the other way, B, can I trust you not to hurt yourself? Tell a story: Bastian Zenkins, his mother's eyes and face and deft hands, cutting fruit for his siblings and saving the peel for himself to chew on.
Tell the story of a boy born on the spring equinox, a day of new beginnings, and he often feels that the metaphor is wasted on a second-born son. Tell the story of the work we are put to and the work we take up: Bastian did not choose to be a brother, but he will choose to be a good one, choose to do the best he can with hands born to pick the pith out of peeled tangerines and shoulders born to carry another and laughter born to be heard and echoed.
What does it mean to be a brother? Someone you have to have. Someone you don't have to love. Bastian is not a brother meant for goodness, not a brother who has to be good, but he is a brother nonetheless. Bastian can be a good brother—Bastian wants to be a good brother.
So he becomes one.
C
Cleo Zenkins was born on the hottest July night of the year, under what her older siblings swear was a scarlet sky, and she wonders if that's why she gets so angry, if the fever running in her blood comes from that old devil heat. Then she thinks that no, summer has nothing to do with it. It's the world's fault for being so easy to be angry at.
You're too curious, says her big sister, fondness belied by concern. You're too clever, scoffs her big brother, who had taught her to read. Her little brother snuggles under her arm, eyes shrouded by hair he refuses to get cut, and tells her with all the solemness of a child that she must really love the world, if she keeps looking for reasons to save it; she smiles at him, the only kid who gets it, hides that smile in his growing hair as a gift. Cleo Zenkins hates people, but loves her family, which is how she knows there's an exception to every rule.
Tell a story about Cleo, who falls in love with stars and planets, gas and rocks, the possibility of life out in the beyond—she likes looking up at a sky bleeding with light and feeling small. Eyes on the bigger picture, Bastian once remarked, affectionately tugging on her ponytail—back then, she hadn't cut her hair yet, still hoping to make a world record before she decided that the troubles of showers weren't worth a trophy. Remember us plebs sometimes, C, 'kay? And Cleo tries, honest, she does, but gravity never could hold her down, and her head is filled with stardusted dreams.
Tell a story: four-year-old Cleo, climbing out onto the windowsill in the middle of the night, because even then she had been half in love with the Milky Way. Tell a story: a foot misplaced, a slippery shingle, a scream that jolted everyone in the house wide-awake in seconds. Remember: Let go, C. Frozen fingers clamped around wood, bare feet scrabbling against the brick. Her mother's voice, somewhere beneath her. I got you. I'll catch you. Remember: the fall. Remember: the landing. Two wire-tough arms tucking her under her mother's chin.
Tell the moral: Cleo has never been good at holding onto anything. Cleo has never forgotten that split second of terrifying, exhilarating, blinding free fall, what it means to be saved only by blind trust.
Tell a story: eleven-year-old Cleo, climbing out onto the windowsill, a telescope in one hand and a tether in the other, her younger brother keeping one hand on the anchoring knot. The sky holds fire, eternities, stories, and she wants so badly to unravel every secret.
Tell the moral: Some things don't matter to the universe, so it has to matter to us.
D
Dante Zenkins, as the baby of the family, grows up braiding his siblings' hair, because no matter how old he'll get, they hesitate before denying him anything. Baby brother privileges. He grows up twisting Andrea's thick waist-length curls into complicated braids, which she'll let him work on for an hour but insist on undoing at the end because of how it pulls at her scalp; he grows up pulling a comb through knots, deaf to Bastian whining, tying it back so it just tickles the back of the neck; he grows up decorating Cleo's head with star-shaped clips and flower pins and every hair accessory he can get his hands on, plus a few that don't really belong in hair. He grows up memorizing the smell of their shampoo, and he'll only learn much later that they always use the brand that smells like strawberries because it's his favorite ice-cream flavor.
Dante is greedy, greedy, greedy, spoiled rotten by older siblings who tried to give him everything he ever wanted. Their patchwork hand-me-downs, their leftover desserts. Tell me a story, he says when they tuck him into bed, and they sit down, helplessly obedient, helplessly affectionate: Whatever you want, D. All those stories are only borrowed memories, but Dante loves the way they melt in his mouth. Dante loves them just for trying, it's the reason they've never stopped. Tell a story about baby Dante, the youngest and smallest of his family, the perfect size for Andrea to scoop up, for Bastian's piggy-back rides, for fitting under Cleo's chin during her rare hugs. Dante is small, and silly, and sweet, and he makes himself something for his siblings to fawn over. Stop waiting to be old enough to help; realize that you're young enough to make them happy.
If Dante was a story, he would be the happy ending. He is supposed to be the happy ending, because everyone else worked so hard to give Dante a better life than them, and he doesn't know how to apologize for that, doesn't know how to tell them that they tried for nothing. Dante is the youngest, but he is old enough to help in the kitchen, old enough to burn himself on the stovetop, old enough to bandage it on his own and hide it under oversized sleeve hems. He is old enough to realize that his siblings are happier when he's happy too.
This is a story: Dante shares his birthday with his least-favorite holiday, but he smiles all the same whenever Halloween rolls around, because his siblings put in so much work in putting together patchwork costumes and glow-in-the-dark decorations and jack-o-lantern carving contexts. Dante spits out chocolate and hates pumpkin spice, but he loves his siblings enough to lie to them, say yes, yes, thank you for this, you've made me so happy, and it's not really a lie, if them being happy makes him happy too.
E
Back when Emmanuel could still be confused for Esteban, he and his twin brother took turns tending to their grandmother's grave. Abuela was a rough, iron-jawed woman, all sharp bones and worldly wisdom and an old rumpled apron that still smelled like cinnamon; she hated cutting flowers, found it cruel to doom a thing to death for its beauty, so they scraped up enough money to commission a bouquet of copper roses that shone like the sun against the stone. Whole years would go by where the only times their paths crossed were whether or not the other had polished the roses before they could, a proof of care from the only other person who loved her this much.
No one's ever said they had to be close. Emmanuel's world was lived in churches and graveyards, dusty books and sacred relics, coaxing those withered seeds of wounded faith to find something brighter to grow for—Esteban's world was always gonna be too bright, too grand, too big for li'l ol' Alphabet Soup. Esteban always had been the dreamer out of the two of them. The only thing that tied him down was Abuela, and once she was buried, there was nothing left to stay for, not even his own brother. And, really, Emmanuel doesn't mind it. Never has. It's not that he and his brother hate each other, but rather that they chose different paths in life and always knew they would. The beginning and end of their relationship was a shared grandmother they buried before they were eighteen, and there was nothing wrong with that.
Listen: Esteban is his brother. Esteban is the only brother he'll ever have. He doesn't need to love him to know that.
These days, everyone knows who Emmanuel is. No more mixing up the twins. These days, Emmanuel brings a freshly cut red peony to the graveyard, because Abuela might have disapproved of the waste but Esteban was always too romantic to care. These days, Emmanuel tries to keep the church together, tries to not think about his ex-wife, tries to convince his only daughter to get out of the house. She's too much like her uncle to be happy here. She's too much like her mother to listen to him. These days, Emmanuel's niece has stopped knocking on his door and asking for stories about her father. It's not that she's given up—Andrea's far too stubborn for that—but rather that she has realized that Emmanuel does not have any stories to share. Go to your mother, he tells her, keeps telling her, she knew him better than me, especially near the end. Go to the only woman my brother has ever loved. Even if it had killed him, it's more than the two of us ever shared.
Emmanuel returns to his sermons, his bibles, his pulpit, his parishioners. His daughter. These are the only things he will ever love. These are the only things he is willing to risk his heart loving. See, he has never been as brave as his brother. He is trying not to wish that he was.
F
Frida: daughter of Emmanuel, daughter of Felicia. Frida: cousin of Andrea Zenkins. Frida looks more like Andrea's sister than Cleo ever will—similar hair, in the way it curls, the same curved jawline and heavy eyes—but she will never be her sister. Only a cousin. Only a girl related through a father Andrea will never know.
Understand: Andrea looks at Frida, who is beautiful, fierce, honest, everything Andrea wishes she could be and everything she hates to become; Frida looks at Andrea, her baby cousin, the only Zenkins she has any claim to, and pretends to herself that she is not an only child. Understand: Frida is an only child. Frida fears her mother, hates her father, loves her cousin, and all the wasted love goes to Andrea, the last person left she's willing to give it to. Frida is an only child, but Andrea is her sister. Even if she is not Andrea's sister. Very well, she is accustomed to unrequited relationships. Understand: Frida is grateful, not forgiving. Her mother had been trying to love her. Her father had been trying to spare her. Her uncle had not tried at all, in the few memories she has of him, but he had given her a cousin. Wasn't that enough?
Yes, Frida thinks, bitter, always bitter. Yes, it is enough. She's spent her whole life trying to make everything else enough.
Tell a story: Frida calls Andrea beautiful, means it with painful honesty. Andrea bites back her reflexive reply, asks instead if Bastian had paid her to say that, and her cousin smiles, fondly amused, denies any outside interference. Can't I look at my favorite baby cousin and call her beautiful? Felicia had taught her daughter that beauty was pain, was effort, painted faces and fine clothes and a striving for perfection; Frida disagreed as she often does with her mother. Andrea knows what she's worth—that makes her beautiful.
Andrea scoffs: And what would you say I'm worth?
The world, says Frida, and Andrea has to look away again.
Gratitude is not forgiveness. Frida teaches her cousin how to love the earth. This is how you grow things, this is how you nurture them. Making something out of nothing, living on water and spite alone. Sometimes you don't get any sunlight, Frida tells her cousin, to whom she would give all of summer if she could, but that doesn't mean you don't deserve it, so find ways to make your own.
G
Tell the story of the boy with purpling knuckles, broken noses, split lips; tell the story of running into a stranger in an alleyway who saves his life without being asked to. Tell the story of how Guillermo made his first friend. He's not Isadore's first, that honor belongs to Hester—but Isadore's still his. Tell the story of three kids who raised each other: Isadore swindled, Hester sweet-talked, Guillermo pulled them out of trouble by the hoods of their jackets. He got big enough to carry them while he ran, which was good, because for all their brains, neither were sensible enough to run when they should.
Guillermo is a brute and a cheater and a cynic. He is also Isadore's best friend. When Ziah had revealed their son to him, Guillermo told Isadore that if he only asked him, he would burn down her house. "Please don't," Isadore had said, smile brittle, "my son needs a place to live, after all," and Guillermo had scoffed, insisting that the boy could live with them, even though they both knew that the three of them would be terrible parents.
Ziah wanted a child. Ziah got a child, and she would take very good care of them, Isadore can live with that. Guillermo doesn't think he can, but he'll learn. He loves Isadore enough for that. Tell this story: Guillermo is Isadore's best friend, and that means he has a duty to Bastian, he is not so cowardly as to pretend otherwise. Guillermo is Isadore's best friend, so he will pull Ziah's son out of trouble, fingers hooked into the shirt collar, just like he did for his father.
Love of my love, Guillermo thinks, looking into the silver eyes Bastian inherited from his mother, before setting him back—gently—on his feet, hand clapping on his shoulder. Come here anytime you need to shake a tail, kiddo, you're Isa's boy and that makes you family, no matter your mother. Never forget that, 'kay?
H
Hester does not have a story. Or, well, she must, because everyone does, but Hester says she doesn't and Guillermo and Isadore glare down anyone who tries to pry and for the most part she's left alone with those secrets. She never shares them, not even with her only friends; she'll take her story to the grave without a flicker of regret.
Talk about Hester, who is flighty and petty and smart-mouthed, who has a crooked nose from a fracture that never healed right. Talk about Hester, Isadore's oldest friend, Guillermo's drinking buddy, their fellow troublemaking tagalong. Talk about the girl who used to slash tires just for the hell of it—talk about the woman who still hides a pocketknife in her shoe, just in case. Only one time did Guillermo ever try to ask her for her birthday. Isadore knows her well enough to never try.
There are things you fight for. There are things you let go of. Isadore tells Hester about her godson and she thinks about the five-month leave he never questioned her for. She thinks about a life she could have had: white picket fences and a two-car garage and a baby stroller shoved under the kitchen counter. The thought lasts only a moment: her friend is asking her for help right now. Isadore is asking her if she will love his son. Hester smiles at him, a moon-pale curve of crooked teeth: an answer all on its own, a better promise than any number of words.
So: Hester hates Ziah, but Bastian is her best friend's son and she can never hate him. Hester hates Ziah, but she welcomes her son with strained smiles, gentled hands, annual birthday gifts. Hester hates Ziah, but not more than she loves Isadore, so she teaches herself not to hate their son. Hester teaches Bastian a recipe for hot chocolate because she loves half of him and is willing to round up, and she knows he won't ever forgive her for that, but that's okay. As long as he has something sweet to remind him that he is theirs too.
I
This is a story about Isadore, a boy born and raised in Alphabet Soup, who chose to stay for the sake of the life he wanted with his best friends. Isadore, with his vulpine smile, his cobra-quick fingers, his laughter-crinkled eyes—Isadore, a delinquent-turned-businessman, owner of one of the last local businesses still left in the town—Isadore, a gambling man, a showman at heart, giving himself away as easy as candy until one day something gets taken that he can't get back. He tries not to regret it. He won't regret it. Just because he never wanted to be a father doesn't give him the right to pretend he isn't.
A story about Isadore is telling the story of Isadore's son, the story of Bastian. Isadore's son looks nothing like him. Isadore's son looks like Ziah, back when he first met her; Ziah, in his light hair and narrow face and sloping sunburnt cheeks. But Isadore knows his blood when he sees it—his son shuffles cards so quick you barely see how he's stacking the deck, his son wears sleeves with cuffs that reach his knuckles so he can smuggle dice and save candies to tuck under his wrist. Bastian doesn't call him Dad, just calls him Isadore, mirroring his father's lopsided smirk when he asks how the business is doing these days. Isadore smiles back, calls him darling, sweetheart, dearest of my heart, spoils him rotten.
Isadore does not care for Bastian's siblings—Ziah's children—he does not care for anything about Ziah, really, even with the remnants of affection he bears for her—he is not their father, not like he is Bastian's father, and caring about one child is enough of a burden. When they come to the store, he treats them like customers. Depending on his mood, he offers special discounts. He will not give anything more. He is done with giving more.
(It does not ever occur to Isadore that Bastian is a little brother first and a big brother second, that being a son is a third priority on the best of days—that Bastian will not accept a father who denies his siblings, no matter the mother.)
(Mostly, it doesn't occur to him because it's still not enough to change his mind.)
JKL
The Moons decided to try just once to have a kid, and upon the discovery of triplets, decided to not risk having any more. Certainly they couldn't afford to. Their darling children took after their mother in temperament and their father in luck, and they looked so alike in face that they dyed their hair different colors to be distinguishable by the general public. Joy Moon took the blue dye and made it her theme; she's never not dressed head-to-toe like a bluejay. Kai Moon had the second pick and went with red—he's since gone all-in with the macabre vibes, donning tacky skull-shaped jewelry studded with blood-red jewels. As such, Leo Moon was left with green, and out of spite, he'd selected the most fluorescent, headache-inducing, eyesore of a shade, which—to his delight and everyone else's horror—was also discovered to glow in the dark.
Talk about Joy, who's quick to anger but quicker to forgive. Talk about Kai, the bleeding heart, desperate to liked by everyone. Talk about Leo, bright-eyed, loud-mouthed, fleet-footed. Talk about growing up in a set and deciding to love each other because it's either that or drive themselves mad, and they preferred being sane over being petty. And, really—they all agreed on this—what even was the point of hate? They're stuck with each other no matter what. Talk about three heads like jewels and six eyes like stars; it's hard to miss the Moons whenever they're around, impossible to overlook something so brilliant. Talk about triplets—a trio—a triskelion—a triangle, the strongest shape. They're a year older than Cleo, a year younger than Bastian, which means they slot in perfectly between the four; they're all the same age, same birthday, same parents, and there's not a force in the world that can come between the Moons. Nobody even dares to try.
(Their mother—Mayor Moon of Alphabet Soup herself—she'd tried. Their father—a librarian, a bookworm, who used to read them encyclopedias as bedtime stories—he'd tried. And they got closer than anyone else ever would, but then they went ahead and died, of all things, so that was the end of that.)
We're not like you guys, Joy tells Cleo, we don't like each other, okay, we didn't have to, so we just didn't. Love, not like; that's the way of the Moons, even if it's not the way of the Zenkins. Kai slides a stack of art magazines over to Bastian: I have no idea where you all get the patience to deal with each other. Here I am, stuck with these buffoons, he grumbles, almost fond, but only almost. Leo cheerfully redirects Andrea and Dante out of the cookbook section and to the mysteries they're looking for. C'mon, we're kinda a set! He winks. Some things are just inevitable, y'know?
Cleo sighs, Bastian frowns, Andrea and Dante shake their heads. I'll never understand you three, they say, because it's true, because nobody ever will, because the Moons might as well be their namesake, in the sky and out of everyone else's reach, known only through the sole points of each other, and Joy laughs, Kai laughs, Leo laughs. Oh, we know. Of course we know.
M
Seventeen-year-old Mercy Moon walked into Alphabet Soup with nothing but a deck of hand-painted tarot cards and the clothes on her back, and she went straight to the mayor's house, didn't even check the address. When Mayor Moon finally opened the door, furious at whoever was cutting into the precious little time she had for sleep at two in the morning, all that scathing temper faltered at the sight of the bruised, skinny, half-frozen kid on her doorstep.
She said she was a cousin, very distant, had a dozen unreadable letters to confirm a relation strung together by broken marriages and forgotten relatives and a single shared surname. She begged for a place to stay. Please, she had said, because Mercy Moon was many things but never too proud to beg. Please, I have nowhere else to go.
And nobody is quite certain how much of what that girl had said was the truth, not even the Mayor, but. Well. Better to risk being a fool, she told her husband later, with the self-proclaimed cousin on the fold-out couch, then to risk being cruel, and he had nodded, agreeing, of course, he had. It's the reason they got married.
Tell me a story, asks Wendell, and Mercy tells him that she was born in the New York subway tunnels, except when she was born in the eye of a Florida hurricane, except when she was born in a ski lodge cabin on Mount Juneau. She is a disguised princess, except when she is a tragic refugee, except when she is a world-renowned thief. Her real name is Miranda—Meredith—Muriel. She tells a new story each time Wendell asks, and he believes each one, every time, up until the new truth she spins for him.
Tell a story: Madeline Moon named her daughter for a virtue she hoped to bless her with. Forgive your parents, forgive your neighbors, have grace for every hurt you are inflicted with, the world matters more than you, sweetheart.
It is the first of many things Mercy will never forgive her mother for.
Tell a story: Mercy is a fortune-teller—a scammer, a hustler, a con-artist—and Wendell West, son of Alphabet Soup, comes asking if she's willing to play a part in his magic show. She stares at him for a very long time: the smiling curve to his eyes, his rumpled suit jacket, heavy rings adorning each finger of his outstretched hand.
Why the hell not, she thinks, I've got nothing better to do, and she reaches out to shake that hand.
N
Nasrin, called Nana, marries her husband not because she loves him, but because he's the heir of a family fortune and even as a girl Nana had known she wanted to marry rich. She does love him eventually, of course. She's not so cruel as to not try. And Papa is kind where it matters, listens when she raises her voice, gives her a comfortable life untainted by poverty, and it's a fortunate life, it's all Nana's ever wanted: monogrammed towels, hydrangeas in the backyard, cupboards stocked with endless food. She does not linger on the people she took this from. She has it now, and she won't waste it.
Talk about Nana, who never knows her parents, never has a sibling, never knows what it's like to be certain that somebody out there shares your blood—talk about Nana, who saves Papa from his own family—talk about Nana, who bears a son who bears a daughter, and this girl is the only grandchild Nana will ever have and that means something. Means what, she's not sure yet, but family means something, right? That's what her husband says, and Nana is trying to believe him.
There is a difference between being born an orphan and being made an orphan. Nana never had a family, so she's never lost one either, and on the worst days, she and Papa scream at each other about it—they're dead, they're gone, so are mine, you don't get, you'll never get it, ALL YOUR FAULT—
There are good days, too. There are truces. There is their son, their beloved boy, their darling failure, and they once swore to each other to never leave him an orphan too—
Nana looks back at that now, and wants to laugh so she won't scream.
O
Cleo's grandmother is named Nasrin; Cleo's grandfather is named Pascal. They named Cleo's father after the pale pink flowers that used to bloom in their backyard, at least until a neighbor kid got through the fence and ate a handful of petals. Cleo's father tells her the story often: This is why I became a doctor. She asks him if it's atonement. All he can do is shrug.
The first time Oleander received the diagnosis for congestive heart failure, he had been so sure that it was going to be okay. Why wouldn't it be? He exercised regularly, ate a balanced diet, kept careful track of the right medications at the right times. He'd had patients who lived longer doing less. He did everything he was supposed to do and still, still, inexplicably, he is dying. Stage C, the doctors tell him, like he can't read his own blood pressure charts, we'll need to discuss surgery, and before Oleander says sure, whatever, but let me make a call first. They give him ten minutes—and he has Nana's number, Papa's number, he can contact a dozen colleagues who specialize in his killer. But before Oleander agrees to anything, he calls his pregnant fiancé.
He tells her the truth: that he's sick. That he can die.
We're all in danger of dying, Ziah scoffs. Sure, Oleander admits, but Zee, I can't be a dad right now. I can't do that to a kid. I'm sorry.
Oleander wanted to be a doctor so he could fix the mistakes his parents made. He grew up certain that he could single-handedly save the world, of course he could, why not?
He wanted—
I'm sorry I couldn't fix the world for you, Oleander tells his daughter, and Cleo looks up, head tilted, eyes squinting. It's not your fault, she says back. Not forgiveness—neither of them are the forgiving type—but gentleness, maybe. You tried to. So now when I try, I'll know better from you.
One day, Oleander will tell his daughter the truth—he is dying, has less than years left with her—she will rage at his resignation, the very image of her mother all those years ago. She will insist that she is not going to just stand back and let him die.
Oleander will smile at her, the kindest he's ever been, and sincerely wish her good luck with that.
P
Pascal, called Papa, marries his wife not because he loves her, but because he doesn't know what else to do. His parents are buried, their fortune is all left to him alone, and his whole family hates him for it—such a spoiled little boy, such a greedy child, how dare he steal their inheritances, how dare he be so loved by the dead. Papa runs away from it all and it's Nana who finds him hiding in the graveyard. It's Nana who tells him what to do to make it all go away. It's Nana who's made of steel and ice, who lacks the complicated history he does, and her heart is hardy enough to survive breaking others. Papa marries Nana because she helps him betray his family, which leaves her as the last one left, and besides, he promised her a share, didn't he?
Talk about Papa, who raised a doctor so his son could make his own money. Talk about Papa, who cut out every last sibling when they gave up on their inheritance and left the town. Talk about Papa, Nana's husband, because they needed each other more than they loved each other. Papa learns to love his wife, love his son, love his granddaughter, and nothing is lesser for the effort.
His son is dying. Papa has known his parents dead longer than they'd ever been alive—he flounders, now, at the looming reality that a father can outlive his child. It doesn't seem right. It can't be right. There is a word for what Papa is—an orphan—but he cannot think of a word for what he is about to become. Surely, without a word for it, it cannot be real. He spends sleepless night agonizing over his own fault, wondering if it was something in his blood, in Nana's blood, a mistake during the pregnancy or in those early vulnerable years—is it his fault, that his son is going to die? He worries about his granddaughter—is she going to die? He stays away from Cleo, terrified that this malady is genetic, that he will infect her like he did his son, and even when she learns the truth she will never understand, never forgive him.
Poor Papa. Poor old man, so scared of himself, so scared of his family. We have to pity that much.
QRS
It is hard to tell a story about Q, when she's all but reached the end of hers. Forgive her; she's an old lady. She's lived a terribly long life. A good life, she tells Andrea, the best life, I wouldn't trade it for any other. But still. Everyone gets tired eventually. Q tells Andrea of all the people she's outlived and can see the way the girl flinches from the thought of surviving her siblings.
Dear Renata, Q writes.
Adamant Andrea, bold Bastian, clever Cleo, darling Dante—four children bound by love more than blood—muddy footprints down the hallway, bags strewn over the couch, the scratched-up table with one wobbly leg—good children, such good children, they visit because they've convinced themselves their neighbor lost everything. She can't blame them; these days, about everyone's lost something, and a scarred old woman with nothing to her name fits the bill of every tragic backstory.
I know you are more likely to burn this letter, just like every one before. I know you loved a world that did not have me in it, even if that was not your fault. It was not my fault either, Renata.
Her house is grand and ornate and empty, and Q opens it to anyone passing through Alphabet Soup who might need a place to stay. Not an inn, she tells them, just a neighbor, just a waypoint. She is learning to open the doors Renata had once locked.
I am not sorry I could not give you what you wanted. I tried to be, once, but I can't. I'm sorry for that, at least.
Suzette comes first. Then Sven and Sybil, hand in hand, and Serena a few months after. Santiago is welcomed easily, Socrates less so, but they settle into each other nonetheless. Q's too old to do most manual work, so they take over cooking, cleaning, weeding, chores divided after too many hours of petty squabbles. There is laughter in the air again. Q is learning to forgive it.
Thank you, Renata. For giving me this house. For giving me this silence.
There are more lost souls out there, like the six residing under a roof Q is starting to call her own. There is a world out there and Q will not leave for it, not like Renata, but Q will welcome it. Q will love it the way Renata could not.
All my love, Q.
T
Tamar's story is a mother's story. Not a wife's. Some would say the two are inextricable, but Tamar's son is long buried and Tamar's husband was never punished and anyways, Tamar is not Dante's mother. She doesn't want to be Dante's mother. She was a mother—past tense being key there—and she will not replace the only child she's ever had.
Tamar refuses to overcomplicate things. She invites Dante over for lunch, just the two of them, teaches herself what sandwiches she likes best. Just because he's not her son doesn't mean she can't love him. Six months into their weekend ritual, Dante reminds her that he is the living evidence of her husband's betrayal, and Tamar reminds him that Ulysses is her ex-husband, thank you very much, before asking what he thinks of the new lemonade recipe. He tries a sip and instantly spits it out, and she cackles at the way his whole face twists in horror.
This is what it means to be Tamar: learn to bear the bitter things. Chopping onions and gargling seawater; swallowing unsweetened lemonade, black coffee, wormwood tea, sharp enough to burn the eyes, so that she has a reason for damp cheeks. She used to be sweet, once—her son had been sweet, once. She walks alone to the grocery store, head held high, trying not to crumple into the black hole in her side. She buys bubblegum because her son used to blow neon-pink bubbles that got stuck in his hair and she misses the sickly sugary smell. Her story is a mother's story and she sometimes wishes it wasn't.
A mother's story: what it means to be a mother, what it means to stop being a mother. Tamar still calls herself a mom even with no child to call her such, and for this alone she almost hates Ziah—how dare she, this intruder-thief-traitor, how could she do this to her, why does she get the son who survived, she’s a LIAR what about ME—
A mother's story: Tamar is bitter, yes, but she will not be cruel. Tamar will never be sweet for Dante, who is not her son, but she can swallow back the venom and share lemonade with spoonfuls of sugar for him to mix in. She has forgotten how to be sweet, but she can pretend, for an hour every week, that she is not bitter down to her bleached, brittle bones.
U
Ulysses is the worst kind of father. The worst kind of husband. He is a cheater and a traitor and a murderer, as Tamar names him, and he does not refute it. What kind of man lies to two wives? What kind of man lets his son die? Ulysses does not try to love another child. He is certain that he can't. Ulysses will never love the only son he has left, because that boy belongs to someone else. Ulysses does not believe in second chances. He hates himself like it will absolve him—it never will, not that he'll ever realize that.
Here is the story: Dante knows it's better to give up. His father does not want to be his father—his father prefers being the father of a body in the ground, refuses to acknowledge the living. His father is willingly drowning in his grief, and Dante cannot pull him out. He knows all this, and still, once every month like broken clockwork, he walks down to the house two doors down. He sits on the porch, quiet and polite and trying his best to be a good kid. He knocks, just once, and asks if Dad's busy.
There is never any answer. Dante waits ten minutes, then goes back home, where Andrea is pretending she wasn't waiting in the kitchen and that the bowl of ice-cream topped with homemade strawberry jam is only a whim. He wonders if he should be grateful to Ziah for saving him from a man who killed a little brother he would never know.
(Dante already has a brother, a big brother as grand as the sun who he’s adored all his life with all his heart—but in another life, Dante could have been a big brother too.)
Ulysses could have been a good father, and that makes it all the worse, every single choice he made to end up like this, how he rightfully blames himself and never makes up for it. Dante wishes so badly that there was a world where Ulysses was not a liar—then again, maybe in that world, Dante would have never been born. He is the result of his father's mistake, after all. He has learned to live with that, has learned to live with his father being a terrible person but not quite a villain, only mistakes left for his son to take up, and learning to live has come hand-in-hand with a refusal to give up on the only father he will ever have. Just because Ulysses does not deserve forgiveness doesn't mean Dante doesn't deserve to forgive.
V
Tell me about my brother, says Dante.
It's Saturday morning. An early chill is lingering in the air, just starting to warm up as sunlight creeps over the stones. Tamar's already opened three jars of marmalade, each in a different flavor, and is busy assembling enough sandwiches to feed a military platoon. Most of it will go to Dante, of course; he's got three older siblings and she's got only herself. You grew up with that boy, says Tamar, not me. She cuts off the crusts, a snack saved for a later time. How am I supposed to know anything about him?
Not Bastian, says Dante. Marmalade on his face. Light in his eyes. He looks nothing like his mother or his father, but for a moment, she swears—
Have you asked Ulysses? she asks, instead of answering.
Yes.
What did he say?
That the memory of his son belonged to him alone.
Of course. Of course. As if Tamar needed more reasons to hate him.
Just a name, Dante pleads, one name, that's all. Just give me a word to call him in my head. I won't even tell anyone. I promise.
And—
(Fifteen years ago, Tamar's only boyfriend had asked her what her favorite book was, and it took her four whole hours to whittle it down to one title:
Inferno.)
Virgil, says Tamar. A story-turned-name: messy hair, crooked teeth, knobby knees. A kiss pressed to a sweaty forehead. Your little brother's name was Virgil.
(Why?)
Thank you, says Dante.
(Because it told me that Hell could be survived.)
And that is that.
W
What Wendell West wouldn't give to have met Mercy Moon sooner. What he wouldn't give to have known her when they were small stupid kids—sweaty palm against sweaty palm, sweet like half-melted popsicles, a childhood colored in pastels—to have been there when those sad stories were still fresh wounds. What he wouldn't give to have a past as full of meaningful memories of her as the present and promised future. He met her late, but not too late, and thank every star for that: a story where he gets to watch her make coffee, just one mug that they'll end up sharing, hair curling in the steam.
What Wendell West wouldn't give to get Wanda West back. The thing about having a big sister is that you're born with an idol, and Wendell, well, he never really outgrew that like the other kids did. Wanda had been the goddess of his youth, everything golden and beautiful and good he can remember, and those days where she came back into town with stories and gifts, god those days were azure. He used to worry about her never coming back, but no anxious hypotheticals can compare to how his world shifted on his axis when he got the phone-call.
What Wendell West wouldn't give to Warden West. What he wouldn't do for his nephew. He first meets the boy during the funeral and he recognizes him instantly: youngest in the crowd, hair all his mother's, the only one to not look away. Hello, baby West. Hello, nephew o' mine. Falling in love has always come easy to him and the son of his sister is no different.
Mercy, Wendell says later. Three people packed in a van headed back to Alphabet Soup; Wendell's white-knuckled grip around the wheel, Mercy's staccato tapping on the dashboard, Warden asleep behind them. It wasn't supposed to be me. His heartbeat pounds like an army beat, feverish, terrified. Mercy, how am I supposed to do this?
(The story he doesn't know: Warden West, half-awake, keeping his breathing steady and shallow, perfectly silent as his uncle weeps over him.)
Shush, says Mercy, soothing in her bluntness, shush now, Wendy, what're you all in a tizzy for? You gotta be ready to fail. You gotta be ready to get back up again. And then, with her eyes glittering: That's what you're good at.
XYZ
The first name she chooses is Xanthe Xavier.
She's very meticulous with this name, her first name, her first time—all the right documents, all the right cards, even social media accounts with edited family photos. She gets all the affairs in order, triple-checked and then quadruple-checked. Then she heads out to change the world.
Xanthe Xavier is a star. Beloved by her audience, renowned for her performances—golden enough to be idolized but down-to-earth enough to feel relatable—singer, dancer, actor, media darling, she's all of it, a goddess of the modern age. Xanthe Xavier was made to be loved, and she fulfills this mission admirably.
Xanthe Xavier is—
She's young. She's a figment. She's desperate to be a life worth living.
Xanthe Xavier burns out in less than two years, all that work turned into smoke and dust and false memories. She'll get it right next time. She will.
The next name she chooses is Yvette Young.
She's less careful with this one, but more thoughtful. Yvette Young is an only child, middling student, parents mentioned only on the birth certificate—her life is a blank page, brimming with possibility, a future freed from the past.
Yvette Young starts off as a waitress—a shapeless wig to hide a famous face, clunky glasses just for the fun of it, cheerfully guiding new customers through exotic menus. By next week, she's barkeeping on her weekdays and taxiing strangers on the weekends and wears a different color of contacts each time. In between her shifts, she tries her hand at being a pickpocket, just for the fun of it, picks up an assortment of accents to play innocent whenever she gets caught.
So many identities. Just one name. Yvette Young spends every day in a whirlwind of motion, playing up masks for everyone to fall in love with—Yvette Young comes home to a crumbling, molding, one-bedroom apartment, and wonders how the hell she's supposed to endure this. She couldn't as Xanthe or Yvette or even as the girl she was before she learned how to write her own life, and she's all but ready to give up when she picks up rumors of a small town by the sea—a dying place, a lost cause, where more people leave than they stay.
One more time, she thinks, pinning all her patchwork hopes on a dream. One more time.
The last name she chooses is Ziah Zenkins.
Ziah Zenkins has fallen in love four times, and yes, she's loved all four of them, or at least she thinks she did. Ziah Zenkins falls in love, trips on her way back out, and when she bears four children, one for each spill, the first thing she gifts each of them is a split-lipped kiss: a scarlet brand pressed against the top of their skull. Ziah Zenkins chooses love, doesn't fall into it, because something like this can only be chosen, nothing less than that, she chose the pain of a life growing in a belly before it's torn out because yes, little one, you were worth all the blood and tears and vomit. You'll always be worth the trouble.
Ziah Zenkins's children will grow up with every lesson their mother learned the hard way, all the lessons they can be just given with all the blood and tears carefully cleaned off. Ziah Zenkins's children will have a home and a family and a mother who gave up the world for them. Ziah Zenkins's children will be loved through every change they go through, because there is nothing in the whole wide universe that can undo the fact that they are her children and that is all the reason she needs to treasure them.
(And if she feels older, more tired, new aches in her joints—if she used to run so fast, anywhere and everywhere, and now her body feels prone to breaking—well, Ziah names it motherhood and does not dwell on it. There are four hungry mouths to feed, after all. No time to spare for mysteries.)
This is the story of Ziah Zenkins, after all—to the end of Alphabet Soup and past it too.
