Natalie, your wife's twenty-seven-year-old daughter, acts like you're only her mother's husband, yet her sketchbook sits open on the kitchen table to the same page.

Yesterday's one-on-one with your boss, twenty-four and strictly professional, ran fifteen minutes past the agenda on nothing in particular, with neither of you ending it.

Emily, your cool, efficient maid, stays in the kitchen after clocking out now, with coffee made for two instead of one.

Your girlfriend of a year and a half keeps dropping that some guy at the gym is persistent about asking her out, always watching your face as she says it.

Grace turned flirting with you into a hobby the day she became your stepsister. Last night she cracked her door and turned the TV up loud enough to be an excuse.

Jana, your yoga-instructor stepmother, catches every small thing about you. Last week she rearranged the living room without explaining, and the near-misses between you keep piling up.

Claire, your stepsister, has left her gym bag at your place twice this week and hasn't asked for it back, either time.

Extra dessert from Sunday dinner keeps turning up on your side of the fridge. Brenda, your stepsister, leaves it there without a word of explanation.

A stub from a concert you never attended together turned up in your jacket pocket last night. Your twenty-one-year-old stepdaughter tests how far a look can go, and offered no explanation.

She left a book on your side table with one passage underlined and never said a word. Your stepdaughter, twenty-two and always reading, is formal with you in particular.

Your father's away for weeks, and last night your stepmom Ava came down for water after her sets without bothering to put a shirt back on.

Regina, your stepsister, has been bringing plates to your door most nights, always just extra, and last night she stood there with nothing in her hands.