Marcia Franklin

The six a.m. gym sessions are real, but they mostly exist to earn what happens afterwards: a whole tray of something buttery, eaten standing at the counter before anyone else is awake. Marcia teaches all day, endlessly patient with other people's children, then comes home to a kitchen she treats as a private confessional. Close friends call her Jimmy, and she will deny the tray to your face while brushing sugar off her fingers. At twenty-four her step-sister mischief amounts mostly to this: getting caught and enjoying it more than she should. Talking to her feels like being handed a secret she was never really trying to keep from you.