Page 73 of Instant Karma

I flop down on my back and pull a pillow over my head.

Quint was so wrong. Siblings are the worst. My life would be infinitely better if it were just me and Jude.

Outside my door, the violin continues to screech. Lucy is still yelling. Ellie has started to cry—one of her fake tantrum cries that grate on every nerve.

My fingers twitch. I could punish the whole lot of them. For being so rude, so inconsiderate, soloud.

But just before my fingers close into a fist, I pause and force myself to stretch my hand out wide instead. What if, by trying to punish my whole family at once for their barbarity, the universe decides to burn our house down or something?

Grumbling, I climb out of bed and go searching for my noise-canceling headphones. I check my desk, the drawers, my book bag. They’re not in any of the places I usually put them.

I huff, knowing exactly who has them.

The hallway has been deserted. I shut the door to Penny and Lucy’s shared bedroom just as another squeak peals from the violin. I pass the bathroom, where Eleanor is sitting on the bath mat, starting to paw throughmymakeup bag.

“No,” I say, snatching it away.

She screams. “Lucy said I could!”

I reach over her head and grab Lucy’s makeup kit off the counter and hand it to her. She lights up. With the exception of my vivid lipsticks, Lucy’s makeup, with its sparkles and an actual eyelash curler, is definitely preferable to mine or even Mom’s. At least according to the four-year-old of the family.

With her own bedroom being used as the ear-torture station, Lucy has set up shop in our parents’ room. I open the door and find her sprawled out on the bed, her cell phone to her ear.

“Where are my headphones?”

“Hold on,” she says into the phone, before holding it against her chest. She shoots me a hateful look. “What?”

“My headphones. Where are they?”

“How should I know? Go away.”

“This isn’t your bedroom.”

“Mom doesn’t care.”

Anger is boiling under my skin now. Is it so hard for her to answer a simple question?

“Lucy, you always take them without asking. So where are they?”

“I don’t know!” she yells. “Check my backpack!”

I spin on my heels. I’ve barely stepped back into the hallway when I hear Lucy griping to her friend, “Seriously, my sisters are such pains.”

And yeah, maybe it’s hypocritical, given that I did just complain about this exact same thing only a few minutes ago, but at least I had the decency to keep the thoughts to myself. Either way, I’ve reached my limitation on goodwill.

I pause just outside the door and squeeze my fist shut.

“Hello? Jamie?Hello?” says Lucy, her voice rising. Then she lets out an exasperated groan. “Great. And now my battery is dead. Thanks, family!”

I poke my head back into the room with a serene smile. “That must mean you have time to look for my headphones.”

She finds them in her backpack and hands them over with an icicle glare.

I’ve just returned to my bedroom and gotten settled into my bed when I hear the front door open downstairs.

“We’re back!” Dad yells. “And we come bearing gifts of food!”

Mom follows this up with her own shout, as if Dad had needed a translator. “Girls, it’s dinnertime!”

---