He fell back on the couch and let the springs bounce him like a trampoline. The spare room Granny had set up for him was so small it made his chest get tight and his mouth go dry, so he usually slept in the living room. The only cool part was that he could see the blink of the Christmas lights on the leaning tabletop tree Granny had put up after Thanksgiving. Burying his head in the pillow cushions of the couch, he banged his bare feet against the wall and tapped a beat to drown out the buzz of Auntie Glo’s blow dryer and the bass from her speakers.

He pretended to be glad that school was out for winter break because every other kid was glad about it. But being in the classroom was way better than this. In more than a week, it would be a whole new year, but he’d still be in this house with people he didn’t understand who didn’t understand him.

A sour odor filled his nostrils before he heard the cry. His cousin, Nicky, toddled toward him on legs as wobbly as the ones on their kitchen table. The smell of a soiled diaper grew stronger the closer Nicky came, testing the sturdiness of his bowed legs with each step. Nicky reminded him of the way Daddy walked when he was drunk. Mom had always said Midnight would be the best big brother, and now he could see she’d been right. If his little sister had lived, he would’ve changed her diapers, too, and helped her walk and learn her first words.

At age one and a half, Nicky was often the first one up, and every morning, he wandered out to find Midnight, his cheeks red and puffy, eyes bright and searching. All he wore around the house was a diaper that drooped at the crotch when he dropped a load. Auntie Glo rarely bothered to dress him in much else, and she wore just a skimpy nightgown that was so sheer you could see her breasts through it. Mostly, she wore that when Daddy stopped by. Sober, he ignored her. Drunk, he stared a really long time. Once when Midnight invited his friends over to play video games, Auntie Glo walked through the living room to the kitchen three times, and their eyes got wider each time. He stopped inviting them over.

“I got you, little man.”

Midnight carried Nicky with one arm and searched behind cereal boxes on the kitchen counter until he found a clean diaper. Auntie Glo had no sense of order and no appreciation for cleanliness. That’s what Granny started saying three months ago, when she and Nicky moved in with them. He let out a frustrated sigh like Granny would.

“Hold on. Be still for me.” Nicky was pink and doughy, and sometimes when Midnight held him, he pretended it was his baby sister and that Mommy stood right beside them and everything was the way it was supposed to be.

With Nicky’s body wedged in the kitchen sink, Midnight ripped off the boy’s stinky diaper with a quick jerking motion and wiped him with a paper towel he soaked in liquid Ivory. Nicky’s arms and legs flailed, splashing water, some of it stinging Midnight’s eyes.

After cleaning up Auntie Glo’s son, he fixed himself a peanut butter sandwich and grabbed a gallon jug of water. He turned it up to his lips, ignoring Granny’s voice in his head saying it’s not proper to drink from the container.

Midnight heard a door open down the hallway and the pad of feet on the floor. Quickly, he wiped his mouth with the back of his arm and shoved the water back in the fridge.

“You’re up early,” Granny said. A pale light flickered down the hall and she walked into the kitchen rubbing her eyes. “Made your own breakfast, too, I see.”

Midnight had lived with his grandmother for six months, ever since the day he watched Daddy whack Granny’s knickknacks with his aluminum lunch box.

She’d said, The day you married my daughter, I knew you were trouble. But she wouldn’t listen.

Bay horse head vases crashed to the floor and cracked, along with porcelain angel bells that still rang faintly after they hit the ground. Granny crumpled in the corner between the front door and the wall, deflating, like somebody had stuck a pin in her. The general manager at the plant had told Daddy and the others that they were shipping production overseas.

No one knew what to say to Daddy when he lost his job. After his big blowup, Granny found Midnight hiding in the bathtub. Without saying anything, she sat on the edge and put his head against her stomach and rubbed his hair the way Mommy used to do when he was sick.

This morning, Granny fixed herself a bowl of oatmeal and a scrambled egg, nothing sweet anymore. She said if you did something or avoided doing something long enough, it became a habit.

When Granny found out she had diabetes and had to start poking herself with needles every day, Midnight rummaged through her cupboards and checked food labels, throwing away anything with more than a few grams of sugar. He dumped chocolate hazelnut spread, Frosted Krispies, and pickle relish. She hid caramel nougats in the pockets of her housecoat, and he flushed those down the toilet after she went to sleep.

On the mantel was a picture of Granny in one of those big purple church hats tilted enough to cover her left eye. Must have been taken Easter Sunday, since that’s the only time she went to church. His best friend Corey’s folks took him to church a lot, but Granny had taken Midnight to get his first library card, and had taught him how to bake a lemon Bundt cake from scratch and how to change a diaper, insisting there was no such thing as women’s work and men’s work. The same summer she showed him how to thread a needle, she also made sure he could change a tire. He didn’t mind not being taken to church like Corey.

“You know I saw you throwing snowballs at Ruth Tuttle’s car yesterday.” Granny poured unsweetened tea into a mason jar.