Amanda. It wasn’t really a question—and of course she was right. Amanda always had her current sketchbook with her, and this one was chock-full of chickens. Her eyes went to the coatrack, where her bag was hanging, and Sabrina sprang up. “Come on, you have to show me. I love it. Don’t get up. Tell me where. This one?”
Wait, really? Did she really want to show Sabrina her chickens? Sabrina might laugh—people were supposed to laugh, at least at some of it, but there was laughing and there was laughing. Too quickly, Sabrina had her hands on Amanda’s big tote, and she swung around, extending it to Amanda.
“In here?”
“No,” she said, “I don’t think I have anything.” She took the bag, trying not to snatch, and held it tightly in her lap.
Sabrina let it go and took up her place on the desk again. “Later, maybe?”
“If I can find anything,” Amanda said, still clutching her bag. “My bag is a mess. My whole house is a mess.” A mess where her art supplies were the one thing she could always put her hands on, but Amanda’s willingness to share had cooled off.
Sabrina smiled cheerfully. “Oh, mine too. I’m a total slob. It’s the worst. My family is always on me to clean up my act.”
Amanda jumped on the change of subject, even if this wasn’t one of her favorites either. But at least everybody felt like they were kind of messy. Except Mae, of course. “You have no idea. Nancy’s always telling me I should clean up a little at a time and stay after it, but it just doesn’t work, I get home so late and I’m wiped.”
“My mom keeps threatening to go clean out my apartment herself,” said Sabrina. “I’m like, Mom, just stay out of it. I’m happy this way.”
That was far from Amanda’s problem, but she did have one family member she’d match up against Sabrina’s mom every time.
“My sister hasn’t been here in ages, but if she saw my house, she’d be all over me. Supposedly she’s coming to help Mom with Mimi’s, though I’m not convinced she’ll show up. If she saw my kitchen now, she’d freak.”
Sabrina smiled. “Maybe we can keep her off your back. I didn’t know you had a sister coming—that’s perfect. Sisters started Frannie’s and Mimi’s, and now sisters running Frannie’s and Mimi’s.”
“She doesn’t exactly run it.” Amanda rolled her eyes. “I mean, she hasn’t been in the place in six years.”
“We can stretch a little,” Sabrina said. “We like to tell a good story. So she’s coming back after being gone for a while? How’s that going to work? What’s she been doing?”
“I don’t think it is going to work,” Amanda said, happy to share her frustration. “My mom has always run Mimi’s on her own, but now she has this new cook she brought in, and she’s trying to drag Mae home—I don’t know what she’s thinking. They fight, when Mae’s here, even though when she’s not here, my mom is always talking about her. They’re a lot alike, except Mae is this obsessively neat and organized person and my mom is—” She stopped.
Her mom wasn’t something she wanted to talk about.
Sabrina looked interested. “Wait, is your sister Mae Moore? Who wrote Less Is Moore?” She paused, then laughed. “Oh man. That would be tough.”
Damn it, she knew who Mae was. Did everybody? But at least that made it easy to explain. “Exactly. And it sucks, you know? She literally wrote the book on being perfect, but in real life, she’s not so—I mean, she does do all that stuff, throw everything away, put everything back, keep it all clear—but she’s not so . . . fun about it. She’s more pissed.”
Sabrina again hopped down from her perch on the desk. “I know Mae,” she said casually. “It will be great to see her again.”
She knew Mae? Actually knew her? And Mae might be on her way here, to help with Mimi’s— Was that fair? Sabrina must have noticed how shocked Amanda looked, because the diminutive host leaned down and gave Amanda, who was still seated, a one-armed hug.
“It’s okay! We met a long time ago is all, and I see her around. TV is a small world. It doesn’t matter.” She plopped onto the floor next to Amanda’s chair. “It’s not like we’re friends. She seems like she might be hard to be friends with. I’ve got an older sister who’s like that, and we don’t get