Full Cicada Moon

In “The Question,” college is over for the year and Papa, Mama, and Mimi are eating supper in the backyard. Papa explains that he has been offered a teaching position in Texas, and they can move if Vermont isn’t working out for them. Mama stays quiet, while Mimi asks if they would have to move again. Papa needs to know by the end of July if they want to stay or leave. In “Pie, the Moon, and Stacey,” Mama hangs a flag on the front porch for Flag Day. It is also Mimi’s birthday, and the family has Mimi’s favorite lemon meringue pie and Neapolitan ice cream. Stacey and Mimi hop through the sprinklers. Mama and Papa give Mimi a hi-fi record player, and Stacey gives her a new album. She is happy to know that they planned it and talked behind her back for something nice. Stacey stays for a sleepover, the first one since the night Mimi left Berkeley. When they sit on the window seat, Stacey tells Mimi to think about how she’s been on Earth for 13 years. Mimi looks to the sky and wishes new moons had names like full moons do.