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“And I’m sorry, but she sounds like a nightmare.” My brain is so tired right now; I just don’t feel like telling her I’m a vegetarian. “You’re sleeping on a couch. That’s just not right.”
    “Did you show her the nanny suite?” Larissa says.
    “We didn’t do the third floor, no.”
    “Come on,” Larissa says as she tops up our wine. “I’ll show you.”
    The rooms are beautiful, of course. There’s a small bedroom and a sitting room and a little bathroom with a claw-foot tub and Victorian photographs of nude women on the walls.
    “What do you think?” Larissa leans in the doorway, arms crossed. I can’t look at her, and I’m not sure why. Maybe because I’m more weirded out by the whole lesbian thing than I think? Or maybe because the photograph above her shoulder is rather suggestive. I wonder what the other nanny thought about all of this. Maybe it’s why she left.
    “It’s all yours,” Larissa says. “If you want.”
    “I don’t know.”
    And I don’t. I’m supposed to be under the watchful eye of Joy, but I’ve hardly seen her since I got off the plane. There’s never any food to eat at Joy’s, and I still don’t have any money, and Thomas brings me a bagel and coffee every morning because he thinks I’m starving to death. And sleeping on the couchdoes suck, especially because Joy and Bruce usually crash through the door near dawn, a loud drunken duo. And then Joy always calls Cecily and rehashes their entire evening—which they’ve just spent together—at the top of her lungs while perched on the edge of the very couch I’m trying to sleep on. The bed in the nanny suite is huge and pillowed and looks ever so sleepable.
    “Well, it’s not going anywhere.” Larissa sits on the bed. “It’s yours any time.” She leans back, her hands on the bedspread. Suddenly I remember Orion and me on the four-poster in his room in the Big House. What is that about? I blush.
    “I’ll keep it in mind.” I back toward the door. “Uh, thanks for the offer.”
    The boys fell asleep while we were upstairs, so we tiptoe as we put supper out. The table set and candles lit—even though it’s not dark—Maira sits down and fills a plate with lamb and lemon rice and grilled asparagus and salad and hands it to me. I’ve had enough wine by now and am so perplexed by myselfthat I just hold the plate and stare at it instead of taking it and strategically pushing the meat around, which is my usual tactic when confronted with dead animals on my plate.
    “Something the matter?” Larissa asks.
    “Sort of. I don’t eat meat.”
    “Oh, sweetheart, why didn’t you say so?” Maira takes the plate. “I have a perfectly good block of tofu in the fridge. I could’ve done something with it.”
    “Sorry.”
    Maira gives the plate to Larissa.
    “I was going to say something and then I just didn’t. I don’t know why.” I shake my head. “It’s weird.”
    “What’s weird?” Maira fills another plate.
    “Everything, to be honest.”
    Maira sets the meatless wonder in front of me. She and Larissa look at each other with one of those “couple” looks. I guess lesbians have those too.
    “Are you still interested in working for us?” Maira asks.
    “Yes! It’s just that I—” It’s just that what?It’s just that I’m having a panic attack right here at the supper table? My fingers are tingly, and a cold rush climbs my spine, settling into an icy ache across my skull, just like when Orion finally told me about his wife. His wife !
    “Is it because we’re queer?” Larissa’s voice is deliberately even.
    I close my eyes. That is part of it, my guts tell me so, but that’s not all of it. “I think I’m just homesick.” Uh-oh. The tears are preparing for mass exodus.
    “She’s probably tired too,” Maira says, “sleeping on that couch every night...”
    “...if she’s managing to sleep at all, poor thing,” Larissa says.
    The way they finish each other’s sentences makes