Chapter 75 Maters Arising:>2

• The family all came home around the same time for dinner. Mom had grabbed Chinese on the way back from work and we all loaded up our plates. We had a tiny, circular dining room table that my dad had found at a yard sale down the street. It was big enough for four, but not six, so Lucy and I set out stack tables in the nearby living room and ate on the couch.
• For such a large family -- Mom, Dad, my three sisters and myself -- dinner was upsettingly silent. I remembered how meals used to be, all of us carousing around the big table, talking excitedly about what had happened that day. Here, though, the clatter of utensils and plates overwhelmed whatever urge we might have had to say anything to each other. And what was there to talk about, really?
• I waited till everyone seemed truly lost in their own worlds, then I elbowed Lucy. She turned and glared at me.