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at all.”
    “Sorry. How long should I heat this for?”
    “Two minutes should be plenty.”
    He punched in the numbers. “I’m sorry I was late. We had to push the bikes back.”
    Mom hummed. “Tell your father what happened. I’m sure he’ll help you fix it.”
    Calvin nodded. He watched the digits on the microwave tick down. Sure, maybe Dad could help him rig up a throttle cable, if Flannery’s father at the bike shop couldn’t find one. Provided Calvin could get his father to focus on anything but work and the television for ten minutes. Maybe working on something mechanical would get his attention, but if Calvin tried to talk to him about Stacey,Dad would probably grunt and move his lips like he was chewing something while his eyes glazed over. He’d been like that since the funeral.
    Michael would’ve given up sleep to get the Yamaha running again. And Michael would have listened to anything Calvin needed to talk about.
    Calvin squeezed his eyes shut. He had to focus on what was important now.
    Tyler was probably right, that Stacey would make some excuse or come up with some reason she needed to spend time alone with him rather than hang out again with Calvin’s friends. And if he pressed her about passing out, not eating, losing weight, freaking out about Flannery, even changing her hair, they’d argue about all that too. But she didn’t rule him. No way was Tyler right about that.
    The microwave dinged and Calvin pulled out his dinner. The plate burned his fingers. He hissed and practically threw it onto the dining room table. Mom shot a glare at him from the kitchen sink. Holding back a groan, Calvin plopped down in a chair and tugged at his hair while he stabbed at not-so-fluffy-anymore mashed potatoes.
    He’d get to the bottom of this mess, even if it meant getting into an argument with Stacey. He had to have some answers. Tonight.

Chapter 4
    T he smaller Stacey cut her food, the easier it was to spread the bits around and make it appear as if she were actually eating. Like a magician directing the audience’s eyes away from the trick, as long as Stacey moved her utensils and raised her fork to her mouth, no one noticed what was on her plate, pushed to the sides, or hidden under a slice of bread.
    Sirloin steak, pan-fried—
seriously, Mom?
—with sautéed mushrooms and onions. Corn on the cob dripping with butter before it hit Stacey’s plate, and a salad with every kind of topping including bacon bits and egg crumbles. Daddy’s favorite meal. The steak, with the mushrooms and onions scraped off, would be around three hundred calories for three ounces. Mom had given her twice that. The corn, with the butter, she estimated to be around one hundred calories. Stacey carefully trimmed the fat off the meat and cut it into miniscule pieces, and did surgery on the corn to extract half the kernels. She nudged acceptable portions to the good side of her plate. One hundred fifty calories. She pushed a little bit more to the bad side.
    If Daddy were paying attention, he’d analyze her plate like a crime scene. But her sister’s one-woman revolt conveniently distracted her father’s eye.
    “What am I supposed to do, sit around here and stare at the stupid television every night?” Renee said. “Excuse me, but I’m not into numbing my brain.”
    Still in his khaki-colored uniform, Daddy shoveled a huge chunk of steak into his mouth. “You were out last night. You’re staying home tonight.”
    Renee slapped her hand on the table, rattling her multitude of bracelets. “It’s Friday! And Preston promised his best friend we would be there for his band’s debut.”
    Preston Stiles, the current boyfriend. His pretentious name befitted his family’s old-money status. But money obviously didn’t lift the guy above loser status in Daddy’s opinion.
    Stacey raised her empty fork to her mouth, tasted a bit of saltiness on the tines, and pretended to chew. She glanced at her mother, who dabbed at her