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Jamie wears midnight blue with a black skirt that has double buckles. I choose green for Oliver, dark enough that it looks nearly gray until the light catches it and leave the top two buttons open so the bar through his nipple shows when he moves. Simon gets a red shirt with the sleeves folded precisely below his elbows. The color makes his shoulders look broader.

They aren’t matching. Matching would make them look cheap. They belong together because I chose them to.

I take them downstairs in order, Jamie first, Simon in the middle and Oliver last.

The table in the playroom is already prepared. My tea set waits on a white cloth, four tiny cups arranged around the pot Dad gave me before the dollhouse. The gold along the rims has worn thin in places, and one saucer has a hairline crack that never spread because I know how to handle fragile things.

Simon stops in the doorway. His attention moves from the table to the cup nearest him, then to me. “That won’t hold enough tea to wet my mouth.”

“It will hold exactly what I pour into it.” I point to his place, and he lowers himself onto the carpet with less grace than Oliver manages beside him.

Jamie sits closest to me. He touches the edge of his blue sleeve and glances toward the cookie plate in the center of the table.

Simon leans toward the plate and smells them. His expression changes immediately.

“If you insult my cookies, you won’t eat anything you baked,” I tell him.

His eyes move to the second plate. The mini cakes he baked this morning are on it, lightly browned and dusted with sugar.

“You bought those in a store,” he says, nodding at the other plate.

“I know where I bought them.”

“I’m making sure we agree they weren’t produced by anyone with self-respect.”

I slide the store-bought plate closer to him. “You’re going to eat one first.”

Simon takes one from the plate and bites through it while Jamie watches.

“Well?” I ask.

Simon chews. “It’s good.”

The lie is terrible.

Before I pour the tea, I turn on the lights inside the dollhouse. The tiny kitchen glows first, followed by the playroom and the three bedrooms above it. I open the front and arrange the miniature table in the little playroom, then take each doll from his bed.

The little Jamie sits closest to the tiny version of my chair. Oliver goes across from him, and Simon takes the place between them. I put a white bead in front of each doll as a cup and set a thimble in the middle for the pot.

Jamie leans closer. “Are they having tea too?”

“They’ve been waiting longer than you have.” I straighten the tiny Simon’s red sleep pants and move his chair a fraction closer to the table. The original dolls always sit wherever I place them without answering. My new ones talk back.

I return to the real table and pour the first cup for myself. The tea reaches almost to the gold rim, and all three men watch me drink before I fill theirs. The ugly bracelet slides down my wrist when I tip the pot. Jamie’s eyes follow it, and something in his face goes quietly smug.

“You wore that to tea?” Simon asks.

“She wears it every day,” Jamie says.

“There are rules,” I say. “You will say please and thank you. You will pass whatever you’re asked for, and nobody will use ugly names at my table.”

Simon looks toward Jamie. “What if the ugly name is accurate?”

Jamie reaches for a cookie. “I assume you mean rat.”

I rest my hand over the ruler in my pocket. Both of them look at me before either puts another word in his mouth.

Oliver waits until the silence settles. “May I have the cream, please, Jamie?”