"Of course I don't, but that doesn't mean I don't want to sleep there when I come home."

My mother sighed. "We made some changes," she murmured.

"Yeah, I noticed. So what's the big deal?"

"We, um... well. We kind of got rid of your bed."

I was speechless. "You got rid of..."

"Tanya needed the s.p.a.ce for her loom."

"There's a loom in there?"

Indeed there was. Tanya stomped up the stairs, unbolted the door, and stomped back downstairs, looking sullen. I entered my room and saw the loom, a computer, a battered futon, a few ugly pressboard bookshelves covered with plastic walnut veneer, containing volumes with t.i.tles like Smart Women, Foolish Choices, and Courage to Heal, and It's Not What You're Eating, It's What's Eating You. There was a rainbow-triangle suncatcher hanging in the window and, worst of all, an ashtray on the desk.

"She smokes?"

My mother bit her lip. "She's trying to quit."

I inhaled. Sure enough, Marlboro Lights and incense. Yuck. Why did she have to plant her self-help guides and her cigarette smells in my room? And where was my stuff?

I turned toward my mother. "You know, you really could have told me about this. I could have come down and taken my things with me."

"Oh, we didn't get rid of anything, Cannie. It's all in boxes in the bas.e.m.e.nt."

I rolled my eyes. "Well, that makes me feel a lot better."

"Look," she said. "I'm sorry. I'm just trying to balance things here"

"No, no," I said. " 'Balance' involves taking different things into account. This," I said, sweeping my hand to indicate the loom, the ashtray, the stuffed dolphin perched upon the futon, "is taking what one person wants into account, and completely s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g the other person. This is completely selfish. This is absolutely ridiculous. This is..."

"Cannie," said Tanya. She'd somehow come up the stairs without my hearing.

"Excuse us, please," I said, and slammed the door in her face. I took a perverse pleasure in listening to her work at the door handle after I'd locked it with her lock.

My mother started to sit down where my bed used to be, caught herself mid-sit and settled for Tanya's desk chair. "Cannie, look. I know this is a shock"

"Have you gone completely crazy? This is ridiculous! All it would have taken was one lousy phone call. I could have come, gotten my stuff..."

My mother looked miserable. "I'm sorry," she said again.

I wound up not staying the night. That visit occasioned my first- and, so far, my last- stint at therapy. The Examiner's health plan paid for ten visits with Dr. Blum, the smallish, Little Orphan Annielooking woman who scribbled frantically, while I told her the whole crazy-father-bad-divorce-lesbian-mother tale. I worried about Dr. Blum. For one thing, she always looked a little scared of me. And she always seemed a few twists behind the current plot.

"Now, back up," she'd say, when I'd segue abruptly from Tanya's latest atrocity to my sister, Lucy's, inability to keep a job. "Your sister was, um, dancing topless for a living, and your parents didn't notice?'

"This was '86," I'd say. "My father was gone. And my mother somehow managed to miss the fact that I was sleeping with my subst.i.tute history teacher and I'd gained fifty pounds during my freshman year of college, so yeah, she pretty much believed that Lucy was babysitting until four every morning."

Dr. Blum would squint down at her notes. "Okay, and the history teacher was... James?"

"No, no. James was the guy on the crew team. Jason was the E-Z-Lube poet. And Bill was the guy in college, and Bruce is the guy right now."

"Bruce!" she'd say triumphantly, having located his name in her notes.

"But I'm really worried that I'm, you know, leading him on or something." I sighed. "I'm not sure I really love him."

"Let's go back to your sister for a minute," she'd say, flipping faster and faster through her legal pad, while I sat there and tried not to yawn.

In addition to her inability to keep up, Dr. Blum was rendered less than trustworthy by her clothes. She dressed as if she didn't know there was such a thing as the pet.i.te section. Her sleeves routinely brushed her fingertips; her skirts sagged around her ankles. I opened up as best I could, answered her questions when she asked them, but I never really trusted her. How could I trust a woman who had even less fashion sense than I did?

At the end of our ten sessions, she didn't quite p.r.o.nounce me cured, but she did leave me with two pieces of advice.

"First," she said, "you can't change anything anybody else in this world does. Not your father, not your mother, not Tanya, not Lisa..."

"... Lucy," I corrected.

"Right. Well, you can't control what they do, but you can control how you respond to it... whether you allow it to drive you crazy, or occupy all of your thoughts, or whether you note what they're doing, consider it, and make a conscious decision as to how much you'll let it affect you."

"Okay. And what's thing two?"

"Hang on to Bruce," she said seriously. "Even if you don't think he's Mr. Right. He's there for you, and he sounds like a good support, and I think you're going to need that in the coming months."

We shook hands. She wished me good luck. I thanked her for her help and told her that Ma Jolie in Manayunk was having a big sale, and that they made things in her size. And that was the end of my big therapy experience.

I wish that I could say that, in the years since Tanya and her loom and her pain and her posters moved in, that things have gotten easier. The fact is, they haven't. Tanya has the people skills of plant life. It's like a special kind of tone-deafness, only instead of not hearing the music, she's deaf to nuances, to subtleties, to euphemisms, small talk, and white lies. Ask her how she's doing, and you'll get a full and lengthy explication of her latest work/health crisis, complete with an invitation to look at her latest surgical scar. Tell her that you liked whatever she cooked (and Lord knows you'll be lying), and she'll regale you with endless recipes, each with a story behind it ("My mother cooked this for me, I remember, the night after she came home from the hospital").

At the same time, she's also incredibly thin-skinned, p.r.o.ne to public crying fits, and temper tantrums that conclude with her either locking herself in my ex-bedroom, if we're home, or stomping away from wherever we are, if we're out. And she dotes on my mother in the most annoying way you could imagine, following her around like a lovestruck puppy, always reaching to hold her hand, touch her hair, rub her feet, tuck a blanket around her.

"Sick," p.r.o.nounced Josh.

"Immature," said Lucy.

"I don't get it," is what I said. "Having somebody treat you that way for, like, a week would be nice... but where's the challenge? Where's the excitement? And what do they talk about?"

"Nothing," said Lucy. The three of us had come home for Chanukah, and we were sitting around the family room after the guests had gone home and my mother and Tanya had gone to bed, all of us holding the gifts Tanya had woven for us. I had a rainbow-colored scarf ("You can wear it to the Pride Parade," Tanya offered). Josh had mittens, also in the gay-pride rainbow, and Lucy had an odd-looking bundle of yarn that Tanya had explained was a m.u.f.f. "It's to keep your hands warm," she'd rumbled, but Lucy and I had already dissolved into gales of laughter, and Josh was wondering in a whisper whether such a thing could be dropped to the bottom of the pool for a little summertime m.u.f.f diving.

Nifkin, who'd been given a little rainbow sweater, was in my lap, sleeping with one eye open, ready to bolt for higher ground should the evil cats Gertrude and Alice appear. Josh was on the couch, picking out what sounded like the theme song from Beverly Hills, 90210 on his guitar.

"In fact," said Lucy, "they don't talk at all."

"Well, what would they talk about?" I asked. "I mean, Mom's educated... she's traveled..."

"Tanya puts her hand over Mom's mouth when Jeopardy comes on," said Josh morosely, and switched to "s.e.x and Candy" on the guitar.

"Ew," I said.

"Yup," confirmed Lucy. "She says it's obnoxious how Mom shouts out the answers."

"It's probably just that she doesn't know any of them herself," said Josh.

"You know," said Lucy, "the lesbian thing is okay. It would've been all right..."

"... if it had been a different kind of woman," I finished, and sat there, picturing a more appropriate same-s.e.x love: say, a chic film professor from UPenn, with tenure and a pixie haircut and interesting amber jewelry, who'd introduce us to independent film directors and take my mother to Cannes. Instead, my mother had fallen for Tanya, who was neither well-read nor chic, whose cinematic tastes ran toward the later works of Jerry Bruckheimer, and who didn't own a single piece of amber.

"So what is it?" I asked. "What's the attraction? She isn't pretty..."

"That's for sure," said Lucy, shuddering dramatically.

"Or smart... or funny... or interesting..."

We all sat, silent, as it dawned on us what the attraction might be.

"I'll bet she's got a tongue like a whale," said Lucy. Josh made retching noises. I rolled my eyes, feeling queasy.

"Like an anteater!" cried Lucy.

"Lucy, cut it out!" I said. Nifkin woke up and started growling. "Besides, even if it is just s.e.x, that'll only get you so far."

"How would you know?" said Lucy.

"Trust me," I said. "Mom'll get bored."

We all sat for a minute, thinking that over.

"It's like she doesn't care about us anymore," Josh blurted.

"She cares," I said. But I wasn't sure. Before Tanya, my mother had liked to do things with us... when we were all together. She'd visit me in Philadelphia, and Josh in New York. She'd cook when we came home, call us a few times a week, keep busy with her book clubs and lecture groups, her wide circle of friends.

"All she cares about is Tanya," said Lucy bitterly.

And I didn't have an argument for that. Sure, she'd still call us... but not as often. She hadn't visited me in months. Her days (not to mention her nights) seemed full of Tanya- the bike trips they went on, the tea dances they attended, the weekend long Ritual of Healing that Tanya had taken my mother to as a special three-month-anniversary surprise, where they'd burned sage and prayed to the Moon G.o.ddess.

"It won't last," I said, with more conviction than I felt. "It's just an infatuation."

"What if it isn't?" Lucy demanded. "What if it's true love?"

"It's not," I said again. But inside, I thought that maybe it was. That this was it, and we'd all be stuck, saddled with this horrible, graceless emotional wreck of a creature for the rest of our lives. Or at least the rest of our mother's life. And after...

"Think of the funeral," I mused. "G.o.d. I can just hear her..." And I dropped my voice to a Tanya rasp. "Your mother would want me to have that," I growled. "But Tanya," I said in my own voice, "... that's my car!"

Josh's lips twitched upward. Lucy laughed. I did the Tanya-growl again.

"She knew how much it meant to me!"

Now Josh was out-and-out smiling. "Do the poem," he said.

I shook my head.

"C'mon, Cannie!" begged my sister.

I cleared my throat, and began to recite Philip Larkin. "They f.u.c.k you up, your mum and dad. They may not mean to, but they do."

"They fill you with the faults they had..." continued Lucy.

"And add some extra, just for you," said Josh.

"But they were f.u.c.ked up in their turn, by fools in old-style hats and coats, Who half the time were soppy-stern, and half at one another's throats."

And we joined in together, the three of us, for the last stanza- the one I couldn't even bring myself to think of in my present predicament. "Man hands on misery to man, it deepens like the coastal shelf. Get out as early as you can, and don't have any kids yourself."

Then, at Lucy's suggestion, we all got to our feet- Nifkin included- and dropped our knitted items into the fireplace.

"Begone, Tanya!" Lucy intoned.

"Return, heteros.e.xuality!" Josh implored.

"What they said," I echoed, and watched the pride m.u.f.fler burn.

Back at home, I parked my bike in the garage, next to Tanya's little green car with its "A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle" b.u.mper sticker, hauled the gigantic frozen turkey out of the garage freezer, and set it in the sink to defrost. I took a quick shower and went into the Room Formerly Known as Mine, where I'd been camped out since my arrival. In between short bike rides and long baths and showers, I'd dragged enough blankets out of the linen closet to turn Tanya's futon into a triple-lined oasis. I had also dug a crate of books out of the bas.e.m.e.nt and was working my way through all the hits of my childhood: Little House on the Prairie, The Phantom Tollbooth, the Narnia chronicles, and The Five Little Peppers and How They Grew. I was regressing, I thought bleakly. A few more days and I'd be practically embryonic myself.

I sat at Tanya's desk and checked my e-mail. Work, work. Old Person, Angry ("Your comments about CBS being the network for viewers who like their food prechewed were disgraceful!"). And a note from Maxi. "It's 98 degrees here every day," she wrote. "I'm hot. I'm bored. Tell me about Thanksgiving. What's the cast?"

I sat down to reply. "Thanksgiving is always a production in our house," I wrote. "Start off with me, and my mother, and Tanya, and Josh and Lucy. Then there's my mother's friends, and their husbands and kids, and whichever lost souls Tanya recruits. My mother makes dried turkey. Not intentionally dried, but because she insists on cooking it on the gas grill, and she hasn't quite figured out how to cook it long enough so that it's done, but not so long that it's not leathery. Mashed sweet potatoes. Mashed potato potatoes. Some kind of green thing. Stuffing. Gravy. Cranberry sauce from a can." My stomach turned over even as I typed. I had pretty much stopped being nauseous during the last week, but just the thought of turkey jerky, Tanya's lumpy gravy, and canned cranberry c.o.c.ktail was enough to make me grab for the saltines I'd packed.

"The food's not really the point," I continued. "It's nice to see people. I've known some of them since I was a little girl. And my mom builds a fire, and the house smells like wood smoke, and we all go around the table and name one thing we're thankful for."

"What will you say?" Maxi shot back.

I sighed, wriggling my feet in the thick wool socks I'd swiped from Tanya's L.L. Bean stash, and tugged the afghan I'd lifted from the family room tighter around me. "I'm not feeling especially thankful right now," I typed back, "but I'll think of something."

ELEVEN.

Thanksgiving Day dawned crisp and cold and brilliantly sunny. I dragged myself out of bed, still yawning at ten in the morning, and spent a few hours outside raking leaves with Josh and Lucy while Nifkin kept watch on us, and on the stalking cats, from the porch.

At three that afternoon, I took a shower, blew my hair into some semblance of style, and put on lipstick and mascara, plus the wide-legged black velvet pants and black cashmere sweater I'd packed, hoping that the c.u.mulative effect would be both stylish and slimming. Lucy and I set the table, Josh boiled and peeled shrimp, and Tanya bustled around the kitchen, making more noise than food, and breaking frequently for cigarettes.

At 4:30 the guests started to arrive. My mother's friend Beth came with her husband and three tall, blond sons, the youngest of whom was sporting a nose ring right through his septum, giving him the look of a baffled Jewish bull. Beth hugged me and started sliding trays of appetizers into the oven while Ben, the pierced one, started discreetly chucking salted nuts at Tanya's cats. "You look great!" Beth said, like she always says. It wasn't even close to being true, but I appreciated the sentiment. "I loved your story about Donny and Marie's new show. When you said how they were singing with LeAnn Rimes and it looked like they wanted to suck the lifeblood out of her... that was so funny!"

"Thanks," I said. I love Beth. Trust her to remember the "Mormon vampires" line, the one that I'd loved, too, even if it had occasioned half a dozen angry phone calls to my editor, a fistful of furious letters ("Dear Too-Bit reporter" my favorite one began), plus an earnest visit from two nineteen-year-old Brigham Young University students who were visiting Philadelphia and promised to pray for me.

Tanya contributed green beans with the crunchy canned onions on top and a can of undiluted Campbell's Cream of Mushroom soup mixed in, then galumphed into the family room and built a blazing fire. The house filled with the sweet smell of wood smoke and roasting turkey. Nifkin and Gertrude and Alice arranged a cease-fire and curled blissfully in front of the flames, all in a row. Josh pa.s.sed around the shrimp he'd prepared. Lucy mixed Manhattans- she'd perfected them during a stint as a bartender that followed the topless dancing escapade but preceded her six weeks doing phone s.e.x.

"You look lousy," she observed, handing me a drink. Lucy herself looked great, as always. My sister is just fifteen months younger than I am. People tell us we looked like twins when we were little. n.o.body says that anymore. Lucy's thin- she always has been- and she wears her wavy hair short, so that the slightly pointed tips of her ears show when she shakes her head. She's got full, lush lips and big, brown Betty Boop eyes and she presents herself to the world like the star she thinks she ought to be. It's been years since I've seen her without a full face of makeup, her lips expertly outlined and colored, her eyebrows dramatically plucked, a tiny silver stud flashing and winking from the center of her tongue. She was dressed for the Thanksgiving feast in skintight black leather pants, high-heeled black boots, and a sequined pink sweater set. She looked like she'd just stepped out of a photo shoot, or stopped in for a quick drink before heading off to someone else's much more stylish holiday festivities.