The Six Rules of Maybe

that was not war torn. It seemed to be one of those simple human rights that was so basic that it became impossible, like equality or the pursuit of happiness.
    I waited until Juliet got home, until Hayden had taken Zeus with him to do some work on Will Quail’s boat. Juliet was in her old room, going through the clothes she still had in her closet. She wore a pair of shorts low down on her hips, and a T-shirt that stretched so tight that the bottom of her round belly showed underneath. There was a big pile of pants and blouses and skirts on the floor, which I assumed she was getting rid of. Any other time I might have liked to go through it, trying on things that were her but that maybe could be me with some effort. But now I didn’t even want those things.
    I flung the envelope her way. The corner of it hit the top, fleshy part of her bare arm and fell to the floor.
    “Jesus, Scarlet,” she said. “What are you doing?”
    “Question better asked of you .” I stood in her doorway. I didn’t even want to be in her room.
    “Do you want this?” she asked, before she bent down to see what I’d flung at her. It was a sweatshirt with our school emblem, a tiger, on the front. I’m surprised she was getting rid of it. I’d have thought she’d try to hang on to her glory days as long as possible. Glory days were a pretty simple thing on an island, and even simpler in the sub-island that was high school. They were a whole lot harder to come by out in the big world.
    She looked at the envelope in her hand. Her face got red. She just kept staring down at it, at the jagged bits where I’d torn the paper.
    “You had no right,” she said softly.
    “You have no right,” I said.
    “You butt into everyone’s business.”
    “Only when I need to. Like now.”
    “Need to? Right. You do it because you don’t have your own life. That’s why. That, and a complete lack of confidence and self-esteem. What, the world won’t turn without your help? People won’t fall apart without you.”
    Her words stung. “You brought Hayden into our lives. You brought this baby. You made it our business. You can’t just make a mess and think we’re all going to sit around and clean it up.”
    “I’m not asking you to clean up anything.”
    “We have to watch people get hurt.”
    Her eyes blazed. Maybe with anger but maybe, too, with shame. “ We .”
    “Yeah, we . Mom and me. You’re playing out your family drama right under our noses.”
    She threw the sweatshirt at the top of the pile. “Mom supports me. Mom supports my own decisions. Don’t speak for Mom. You don’t know. At least she remembers that I’m an adult . In your mind I’m not supposed to grow up. I’m not supposed to do anything I don’t get permission for .”
    “Adult? You’ve got to be kidding. It’s the last thing you’re acting like.” I was breathing hard. I looked at her face, the face I’d known for years and years. She was selfish. A selfish person. I’d been second to her first place forever, but now she was making Hayden bow down to her: Hayden, a good person who didn’t deserve it. He shouldn’t have to follow behind her like she had made me do when I was five, carrying the back of her nightgown like she was the princess. “You go on about growing up. You know what I think? You got pregnant so you didn’t have to grow up. So people would take care of you. So you could stay in our childhood forever. You’re afraid to grow up.”
    I hadn’t even known I thought that. But it was clear then. This wasn’t a great big move on her part. It was a way to come home.
    Her mouth was slightly open; she didn’t look like the strong person who got everything she wanted all of the time anymore. She wasn’t the person who stood up on a stage while people sat below her and watched. Maybe that person had been too much for her. She had moved all of the pieces around, moved people and their feelings as if they were for her own use only, and now she had gotten herself backed into a corner.
    “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said. But her words lacked force. She sat on the edge of her bed and held that envelope.
    “Buddy is going to somehow make this better? ”
    “Buddy understands me,” she said.
    She disgusted me then. I shook my head at her stupidity. Buddy wasn’t anything true. He treated girls like shit. He was an idea more than a person.
    “Buddy’s an excuse not to have anything real,” I said.
    She looked