Rules for Stealing Stars by Corey Ann Haydu Page B

else. Especially when it comes to Marla.
    â€œWhat’s that?” I say, pointing.
    Marla grabs her wrist with her other hand like she’s scared of letting me see, until she remembers it’s just the new bracelets circling the delicate bone. There are five of them, beaded and sparkling. Different colors, and I can see that each bracelet has a different word beaded on: KINDNESS, COMPASSION, BRAVERY, HONESTY, LOVE .
    â€œMom gave them to me last night. A special present,” Marla says. “She got them last time she was in California.”
    Mom has gone to California a few times, and Arizona twice and Minnesota and Boston and Florida. She goes Away and gets better. But after a few months or a year, she always gets worse again.
    â€œThat’s not how it goes in fairy tales,” I said to Dadwhen he first explained it to me. That someone can get better and things can be happily-ever-after and then get just as bad or even worse later.
    That was a long time ago now. I’ve understood the not-happily-ever-after-ness for a while.
    â€œWhat do the bracelets mean?” I ask Marla. I think I see something under the bracelets too. A shadow of something on her skin. A discoloration. A shade of light blue that doesn’t quite fit in with the rest of Marla’s arm.
    â€œMom says they mean that we’re all doing our best,” Marla says. She spins them around, and I lose sight of the thing I thought I saw underneath.
    â€œCan I have one?” I ask. I like the way they catch the light, the same way the ripples on the lake do, creating little specks of sparkle and shine. I want the one that says BRAVERY , but Marla gives me KINDNESS . I’m not sure what that means, but I assume it’s either the one she thinks I need or the one she thinks she already has conquered.
    â€œPoor Mom,” Marla says. “The house makes her sad. She said that the other day. She thought it would make her happy, but it doesn’t.” I hate the way Marla takes Mom’s side in everything, even now. I’m boiling, and it’s not from the sun. “You really should be nicer to her,” Marla concludes.
    I leave Marla on the beach. It’s a long walk back, but not long enough to walk off my steaming madness at what shesaid to me. The bracelet feels more like a demand now. A really, really unreasonable one.
    When I get home, Eleanor, Mom, and Dad are on a bike ride.
    â€œMom went on a bike ride?” I say.
    â€œShe did,” Astrid says.
    â€œI’m worried about everything,” I say. And I am—I’m worried about Marla in Astrid’s closet and whatever was underneath her bracelets, and Mom riding a bike, and the bracelets themselves with their too-encouraging words, and the clank of bottles when we take out recycling every other night. And the sister Mom used to have but doesn’t have anymore.
    â€œI have an idea. Don’t tell Eleanor and Marla, okay?” Astrid says. She doesn’t tell me everything’s going to be fine, and that’s why I love her the most.
    Astrid takes a white tulip from a vase in the kitchen. Dad must have bought Mom a bouquet, and that should be a good sign, but in our family it’s a bad one. Dad buys flowers for Mom when he’s scared.
    â€œPut the tulip on the floor,” she says when we’re inside my closet with it moments later. “Or pin it to the wall, if you want. That could be cool.” There are a few rogue pushpins already shoved into the wall, and she nods to them. I guessthat means I should go for it, so I stab the stem of the tulip with a pin and let it hang. If it stays for too long, I’m afraid a petal or two will fall off and what was once perfect will be ugly.
    I want it to stay beautiful and full. I want it to be fuller, bigger, more alive.
    Astrid grins and closes the door.
    â€œJust wait,” she says. So we do.
    â€œFor what?” I say.
    â€œThat.”
    The flower I