“I know you two have better things to do than to come all this way for a social call,” my great- aunt said as she handed me the first cup of tea. The cup warms my hands as I took it from her and leaned back on the couch.

“And don’t you spill a drop of that on my couch, you hear me?”

I glanced at the stained cushions and pulled my elbows in.

“I wish I grew up here,” Kenzie said as she walked around the living room, studying all the various trinkets on the shelves and tabletops. “My parents are so overprotective. They would never have sage burning...