Don't Fail Me Now by Una LaMarche Page A

spin around to find Cass standing in the doorway, hands shoved in the pockets of her hoodie, Mom’s old purple sweatpants—a wearable security blanket we’ve passed back and forth over the years—almost covering her toes.
    â€œYou scared me,” I say, closing the laptop in a deliberately slow way that I hope comes off as casual. “I thought you were—”
    â€œAuntie Dearest?” Cass deadpans. “Nah, don’t worry, she’s still at the hospital terrorizing sick people.”
    I shake my head. “Ugh, can you imagine what it’s like to be one of her patients?” And seamlessly, Cass juts out a hip and cocks an eyebrow, curling her lip into a surly sneer.
    â€œWhat do you want, grandma? I just
changed
your damn bandage last
week
!” she barks in a near-perfect imitation of Aunt Sam’s weary growl.
    I start cracking up, and she saunters over waving a finger, not breaking character.
    â€œYou tell those bedsores ain’t nobody got
time
for them, some of us need to go get our
chins
waxed!” (During one of their bitterer fights, Mom called Aunt Sam The Bearded Lady, and ever since that day we have jumped on every possible opportunity to bring it up.) We double over, trying not to let our cackling wake Denny.
    â€œStop it, I’m gonna die,” I gasp, my diaphragm spasming.
    â€œSorry,” Cass giggles. Within seconds, her features settle back into impenetrable neutrality, the sparkle in her eyesfading to a bored stare. It’s startling to watch, like getting a door slammed in your face. “When do you think we’ll get out of here?” she asks.
    â€œIt’ll be a while,” I say. “I have to save up.”
    â€œWhat about the money from Yvonne?” Cass asks. “Didn’t Denny give it to you?” I must look confused, because she sighs and mumbles, “The little thief.” She darts out of the bedroom and returns a minute later with a roll of bills held together by a hair elastic. “Here,” she says, holding it out. “She said not to give it to you until we left. I guess she thought you might not take it otherwise.”
    I unwrap the cash slowly, gritting my teeth to keep from crying, and count out five twenty-dollar bills, three tens, a five, and twelve ones. With the $200 I emptied from my checking account this morning, this gives me enough to pay Aunt Sam plus $47 left for gas. It’s not much of a cushion, but it’s something. It’ll buy us another couple of days, at least.
    I’m so focused on the tallies in my head that I don’t even notice Cass opening the computer, and by the time I look over, it’s too late. Leah’s dimpled smile (
Dimples. Those are Buck’s. Cass has them, too, she just hasn’t smiled in . . . what, years now?
) fills the screen, a sheaf of golden hair covering one of her giveaway green eyes, a pool of amber-flecked jade, just like mine.
    â€œWho is that?” Cass asks, giving me an odd, suspicious look. She’s perched on the bed, all taut angles, like a runner on the starting block.
    I briefly consider lying, but my brain is too fried. “That’s her,” I say.
    â€œHer who?” I give Cass a look and watch as the realization tenses her features one by one: the full lips thinning, the smallnose scrunching, the straight eyebrows knitting together into a shallow
V
. She squints at the screen. “
That’s
her?”
    â€œYup.”
    â€œDamn,” Cass says, “I always pictured her as more Willow Smith than Taylor Swift.”
    â€œMe too.”
    â€œHow’d you find her?” Cass asks, shaking her head, clicking through the photos. “I thought I’d looked at every Devereaux on here.” She looks at me expectantly, and even though I want nothing more than to avoid this conversation, I can’t work up the necessary energy.
    â€œShe doesn’t use it,” I say.