Chapter 3

My parents need to return to their hotel rooms. They both have early morning flights.

“Oh.” I grip the shirt in my hands a little tighter.

Dad steps away from the window, and I’m alarmed to discover his eyes are wet. Something about the idea of my father—even if it is my father—on the brink of tears raises a lump in my throat.

“Wel , kiddo. Guess you’re all grown up now.”

My body is frozen. He pul s my stiff limbs into a bear hug. His grip is frightening. “Take care of yourself. Study hard and make some friends. And watch out for pickpockets,” he adds. “Sometimes they work in pairs.”

I nod into his shoulder, and he releases me. And then he’s gone.

My mother lingers behind. “You’l have a wonderful year here,” she says. “I just know it.” I bite my lip to keep it from quivering, and she sweeps me into her arms. I try to breathe. Inhale. Count to three. Exhale. Her skin smel s like grapefruit body lotion. “I’l cal you the moment I get home,” she says.

Home. Atlanta isn’t my home anymore.

“I love you, Anna.”

I’m crying now. “I love you, too. Take care of Seany for me.”

“Of course.”

“And Captain Jack,” I say. “Make sure Sean feeds him and changes his bedding and fil s his water bottle. And make sure he doesn’t give him too many treats because they make him fat and then he can’t get out of his igloo. But make sure he gives him at least a few every day, because he stil needs the vitamin C and he won’t drink the water when I use those vitamin drops—”

She pul s back and tucks my bleached stripe behind my ear. “I love you,” she says again.

And then my mother does something that, even after all of the paperwork and plane tickets and presentations, I don’t see coming. Something that would’ve happened in a year anyway, once I left for col ege, but that no matter how many days or months or years I’ve yearned for it, I am stil not prepared for when it actual y happens.

My mother leaves. I am alone.

I feel it coming, but I can’t stop it.

PANIC.

They left me. My parents actual y left me! IN FRANCE!

Meanwhile, Paris is oddly silent. Even the opera singer has packed it in for the night. I cannot lose it. The wal s here are thinner than Band-Aids, so if I break down, my neighbors—my new classmates—wil hear everything. I’m going to be sick. I’m going to vomit that weird eggplant tapenade I had for dinner, and everyone will hear, and no one will invite me to watch the mimes escape from their invisible boxes, or whatever it is people do here in their spare time.

I race to my pedestal sink to splash water on my face, but it explodes out and sprays my shirt instead. And now I’m crying harder, because I haven’t unpacked my towels, and wet clothing reminds me of those stupid water rides Bridgette and Matt used to drag me on at Six Flags where the water is the wrong color and it smel s like paint and it has a bil ion tril ion bacterial microbes in it. Oh God.What if there are bacterial microbes in the water? Is French water even safe to drink?

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