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on cosmetics.” Floy poked Joselle with her elbow and howled. They pressed together in hysterics.
    While Floy went off to shower and dress, Joselle stayed in the kitchen. She opened the silverware drawer and pulled out every teaspoon and tablespoon. She looked at her face in each one. On the back of the spoons, her face was thin and long and right side up. On the other side, her face was wide and upside down. She moved the spoons at varying distances, distorting her face. She was amazed that each time it worked the same—upside down on the inside, right side up on the outside. Vicki had shown her this trick years ago, and Joselle still tested it wherever she went.
    Joselle licked a spoon. My mother is smart, she thought.
    They had been eating ice cream at the kitchen table right before bed the night that Vicki had presented Joselle with this minor marvel.
    â€œIt’s magic!” Joselle had said.
    â€œTry another spoon,” Vicki suggested.
    Joselle tried every spoon in the house, wide-eyed and mystified.
    â€œDoes it only work with chocolate ice cream?” Joselle asked.
    Vicki opened the refrigerator. “Let’s see,” she said.
    Laughing, they tried jam, cold leftover tomato soup, and maple syrup. They tried milk and orange juice, spooning them out of bowls. They tried peanut butter straight from the jar and sugar right out of the sugar bowl.
    â€œ Every spoon is magic,” Joselle told Vicki, her voice cracking with excitement. “No matter what you’re eating with it. Every spoon in the world .”
    They did the dishes together that night, the radio blaring. They played with the suds and serenaded one another using the spoons as pretend microphones. It was after midnight when Vicki finally kissed Joselle goodnight and tucked her in.
    â€œI love being a single girl with you,” Vicki whispered.
    â€œMe, too,” said Joselle. She had closed her eyes, lulled by Vicki’s voice. She was asleep in minutes.
    Joselle put the last spoon in its proper place and closed Floy’s kitchen drawer. She wondered how her mother could be so perfect sometimes, and other times be as far from perfect as possible.
    Joselle was pleased. She had accomplished everything she had set out to do for the entire day, and it wasn’t even 9:00 A.M. Not only had she shown Floy how much she loved her by making her breakfast, Joselle had also made Floy laugh harder than she had ever seen anyone laugh. But more importantly, Joselle had done something daring and original. Something that she thought could shake up someone’s life. She wasn’t exactly sure why she had done it—except she sensed that if she could make someone else more confused than she was, the weight of her own emotions might be lifted. It was worth a try. “Misery loves company,” Vicki often said. The idea had begun during the night as a tiny seed that kept growing inside her until she was consumed by it and there was absolutely no way to fight it.
    It was amazing how everything had come together so easily. Floy had said that he spent a lot of time on the hill. She knew his mother was dead. And she remembered that there were rocks and stones on the hill. In the weak light before breakfast, Joselle had done something that she hoped would complicate the life of Blaze Werla. She knew that if the situation were reversed, it would surely complicate hers. Joselle giggled with delight. She played the themes from “The Brady Bunch” and “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” on her teeth.
    She was in the bathroom with the door locked, sitting on the clothes hamper. When she had finished her tunes, Joselle began decorating her thighs with ball-point-pen tattoos. At first she was going to put them on her arm, but she didn’t want anyone to see them. So she settled on her thighs—so far up that they would only be visible if she were naked. And no one ever got a glimpse of her in that condition.
    REENA