She forced her head up and faced Mrs. Weiss. The last thing she needed now was to be kicked out of the Weiss house

"I’m really sorry, Tamar,” Mrs. Weiss sympathized, “but if either of you needs to, you always have the option of canceling. Something must have come up.”

“Oh, yeah?” Tamar said disdainfully. “What could have come up that’s more important than seeing their sister?”

“I don’t know, Tamar,” Mrs. Weiss soothed. “I’m sure they wouldn’t cancel without a good reason.”

Tamar didn’t respond. A lump formed in the back of her throat and she turned wordlessly and fled to her room. Closing the door to her room and burying her head in her pillow, Tamar finally let herself scream. The noise came from deep within her soul, a piercing guttural sound that was trapped and muffled by the pillow so nobody could hear. After all, there was nobody who wanted to listen. Of course they canceled, she thought bitterly, of course Aunt Dina doesn’t care. Did she ever care? She just wants to take the boys away from me and make them hers! Tamar slammed her fist against the pillow again and again and again beating it down to a pulp. Her throat ached from screaming.

When she finally surfaced upstairs for a drink to soothe the scratchiness in her throat, Mrs. Weiss confronted her. “Tamar?”

Tamar looked away. Then, thinking better of it, she forced her head up and faced Mrs. Weiss. The last thing she needed now was to be kicked out of the Weiss house.