The truth was I'd been fired from my waitressing job on Wednesday morning the week before, information I was still guarding from my mother but joking about regularly with the woman who took care of my grandmother, Josephine, and lived on the third floor of our building. Both my Uncle and mother were coming in on a Tuesday to take Josephine to see the neurologist. I was still a bit high when my Uncle arrived and then my mother, who came in and immediately peered through the door into the living room where I was caught standing, waiting for her to walk toward the kitchen. She could see my feet I guess and stood there a moment, saying tersely "Hello Jess, come out and say hello" as if I had been hiding in the room all afternoon and had not come out to greet my Uncle and if not for her instruction would probably have stood silently in the room until they both left with Josephine.