hearty meals at the dining room table, with organic fruit and chicken, and things I’d never even tasted before, like quinoa from Bolivia. They had brought me into the bosom of family-hood, and I’d taken them for granted. I’d been so out of touch with reality. Me, the rich girl, cushioned by her husband’s lucrative wheeling and dealing, in her gilded, modern, towering castle, like a sort of Rapunzel—yet without the prince and without the bounty of hair to go with it—my bank balance nice and healthy, letting virtual children cook for me, work for me for free. What had I been thinking? I’d been so selfish. Giving them money for groceries, yes, but clearly not enough! Jen was crying and in financial straits. What was wrong with me?
I’d been as insensitive as a concrete wall.
I hovered by Jen’s bedroom door, not knowing what to do next. Playing mother, or a surrogate mother, was no picnic. The triplets were, what, seventeen years younger than I was? Not a big age difference for people in their thirties or forties, but a great divide for those in their twenties. I’d read sweet Jen all wrong from the start. She wasn’t this tough, glamorous, “fuck-you” twenty-year-old, but still a child. How could I even imagine what she was going through with her mother? The triplets’ mom was on her deathbed, by the sound of it, the disease devouring her every cell, and all I had thought about was myself. They loved me. I was all they had right now.
“Jen?” I said tentatively. “Jen?”
“Go ah—way,” she blubbered, her words muffled by her pillow. She was face down on her bed, bawling.
“Jen, please. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean it. Please. Please, let’s be friends.”
“You don’t wa-want me here, it’s so obvious.”
“I do, I love having you all here, I’m just not used to a house full of young adults, that’s all. I love having you all to keep me company.”
“Kate, yeah, you love her because she’s ‘infallible’ and ‘as strong as an ox.’ And Dan, only ’cause you think he’s cute and fixes everything.”
I tiptoed over to the bed and laid my hand gently on her soft blond head. Had I unknowingly flirted with Dan?
“You’re all cute,” I assured her. “I’m fond of all of you, in equal but different ways.”
“Fond? What does that even mean, ‘fond?’”
“That I have fee—”
“I know what it means, it means bullshit. Don’t you get it? Don’t you get that we all feel so much more for you than just ‘fond?’ We love you!”
Her words stunned me. “I love you too,” I said, caressing her hair, and I sort of meant it. As much as you can “love” people after only a month or so of knowing them.
I stayed like that for a while, gently stroking her head, whispering sweet soothing nothings. She calmed right down and dried her tears with her comforter.
“I’ve got an idea!” I said brightly. “Why don’t you and I spend the day together? Why don’t we go and have lunch, or do a little road trip somewhere? We could drive down the coast to Hearst Castle. Get out of the house, how about that?”
“You’ve been drinking, you can’t drive.”
I had already forgotten that. “Well you drive, then.”
“I’ve been smoking a shitload of weed.”
“Good point.” I laughed. “We could do Uber?”
“How much money do you have to burn? Hearst Castle’s miles away.”
“You’re right. Well, I could call a friend and get her to come along, too?” I thought of horsey, jolly Pippa. I didn’t particularly want to see her, but I knew she’d say yes. Plus, I felt bad for being so cold with her at the restaurant and hadn’t seen her in weeks; I needed to make it up to her. She made her own hours and could always take time off work. She could even write a piece about her day out. Sell it to some travel magazine. I wouldn’t tell her who Jen was, that she and her siblings used to own my house. No, that would get Pippa all riled up and judgmental—looking out for my interest, of course—for my “own good”—and I wasn’t in the mood to see concern plastered all over her long-jawed face. I’d tell her that the triplets were second cousins. I wouldn’t get away with “nieces and nephew,” because Pippa knew too much about my family. Second cousins sounded plausible. Even though I wasn’t even sure what, exactly, second cousins were. I’d brief Jen on my