“Everybody calm down!” Olivia laughed, trying to push her parents off.
“Well, I can’t wait to meet her,” her mom said. She stood up and straightened her blouse. “Can she come over tonight for dinner?”
Olivia glanced at her watch skeptically. “Dinner’s in, like, an hour.”
Her mother nodded. “Invite her father, too. I have to meet the man who raised my daughter’s sister! Do you think they like zucchini?”
Olivia shrugged. “Ivy’s allergic to garlic, but I don’t know about zucchini.”
“Well, find out! Go call her! Shoo!” Her mom waved Olivia up the stairs as she made for the kitchen. “Come on, Steve. You can chop the vegetables with your samurai knife.”
Ivy finally located the ringing phone buried in a pile of clothes beside her coffin. She reached in and snatched it up on the tenth ring.
“Hello?” she said, slightly out of breath. “I told them!” her sister’s voice declared. Ivy shoved some books aside and sat down.
“How’d they take it?” She and Olivia had only revealed their twinship to Toby Decker, a reporter for the school paper, on Friday, but when he’d told them that he’d succeeded in writing up the story in time to squeeze it into the upcoming Wednesday issue, the girls knew they finally had to tell their parents. At school today, Olivia had seemed almost as nervous about telling her parents as Ivy was about telling her dad.
“They are so excited about you, Ivy,” said
Olivia. “It was even better than when I told them I got four A’s last year! What’d your dad say?” Ivy hesitated. “Nothing.”
“‘Nothing’ like he couldn’t deal, ‘nothing’ like he always knew,” Olivia queried, “or ‘nothing’ like literally nothing?”
“‘Nothing’ like I haven’t told him yet,” Ivy admitted.
“I-vyyy!” Olivia pleaded.
“Hey,” Ivy said, “you left it to the last possible minute, too, remember? I was about to go upstairs and tell him when you called.” Which was true. She’d been about to go upstairs for the last three hours.
“Okay, okay,” Olivia said. “Do you like zucchini?”
“I guess,” Ivy answered. “Why?”
“Because my mom wants you and your dad to come to our house for dinner tonight.”
“I don’t know if that’s such a killer idea,” Ivy said doubtfully. “My father barely ever eats human food . . . and I worry that meeting your parents so soon might spook him.”
“I’ll make my dad promise not to be weird,” Olivia offered.
It’s my dad I’m worried about, Ivy thought.
“Would it be okay if I came by myself?” she asked. “I could use an excuse to get out of the house after I break the news.”
“Sure.” Olivia paused. “You’re not sounding very optimistic,” she pointed out, “even for a Goth.”
Ivy grabbed a pillow and lay her head on it.
“My adoption is my dad’s least favorite topic, Olivia,” she said. “Every time I bring it up, he changes the subject. And he’s really old-fashioned when it comes to mixing with humans.”
“You think he won’t like me?” Olivia asked.
“No, he will. I know he will,” Ivy replied, uncertain whether she was trying to convince Olivia or herself. “My dad has a really good heart. He’ll make an exception for my blood sister. It just might take him a little while to get used to you.”
“Well, he’d better,” Olivia declared, “because we’re stuck together.”
“Like bubble gum and black licorice.” Ivy grinned. No matter what her dad was going to say, she felt lucky to have found Olivia. She took a deep breath and sat up. “Okay, I’m going to go tell him right now.”
A few moments later, Ivy stood peeking in through the open door of her father’s study. In the center of the bookshelf-lined room, her dad was hunched over a sprawling gray cardboard model atop a high table. From the door, Ivy could see postage stamp–sized color Xeroxes of paintings on the interior walls and elaborate floor lamps the size of chess pieces. She knew her dad was redecorating a wealthy New York family’s crypt—Vamp magazine was already talking about doing a piece on it.
Ivy watched silently as her father adjusted a tiny gray altar in one of the rooms. Next to it, he lay a scrap of dark purple fabric as a carpet, then thought better of it and tried a burgundy one instead.
Ivy loved watching her father work. It was like watching him play with an ever-changing Goth dollhouse. She could just imagine a black-clad, high-society vampire lounging on that altar. “Hello, Ivy,” her father said suddenly without looking up.
“Hi,” Ivy said in a small voice. She’d thought he hadn’t known she was there.
“Is something on your mind?” he asked, picking up a tiny black coffin between thumb and forefinger.
“No.” Ivy gulped. “I just thought I’d say hello. You know how I like to watch you work. That burgundy carpet’s killer.”
Her father glanced up at her suspiciously. “Okay, I’d better get back to my homework and stuff,” Ivy said, her heart racing. “Just wanted you to know I have an identical twin sister named Olivia who’s in my science class. Bye.” She bolted away.
“Ivy?” her father called after her.
She stopped in her tracks and took three slow steps backward so she could see her father again through the doorway. He was standing upright, the miniature coffin held up like a little exclamation point next to the O of his open mouth. “What did you just say?” he asked.