The “our sister” was a gift to Johanna.
“Wouldn’t you take care of her?” our mother said.
I’m in college, was all Sally could think to say in response, but her heart was beating so fast, she could barely follow her own thoughts:
Is this my responsibility?
Is this mainly my responsibility, because I’m the girl?
Are you making Harrison promise, too?
Where was our father in all this?
But she knew exactly where he was. He was somewhere else, with someone else: a beautiful woman with a lovely back who had once—it was unbearable to remember—overwhelmed her with kindness in a museum bathroom. For years she had carried the burden of our father’s secret. She might have shared it with her brothers at any point, she might have wielded it against both parents as a powerful weapon, but she never had. Perhaps the satisfaction of not telling had been one tiny bit greater than the satisfaction of telling. The thought of it now, though, nearly made her explode.
“And what about Dad? I mean, if something should happen to you, shouldn’t he be the one to raise his own daughter? I mean, you have a child together!”
“We have four children together.”
“You don’t have to stay,” she told Johanna, and it was only when she heard it out loud that she thought she might finally understand what this conversation was about.
“I know that,” Johanna said, confirming it.
“Mom.”
“We have the Lobster Tales people coming over around four. We should be here for that, they might need help carrying stuff down to the beach. Will that give you time for your errands?”
Sally looked at her watch. Rochelle’s ferry would dock in forty-five minutes. And the boys, where the fuck were they with her car? With Harriet’s car.
“Can I borrow the Volvo?” she asked.
She would pass Harrison and Lewyn on the Edgartown Road, but her head was so full she didn’t notice, and the boys, in Harriet Greene’s old Ford, didn’t notice her, either. They were on their way back from Katama with two bottles of Champagne for that night’s “celebration” of their birth. The Champagne was Veuve Clicquot. Harrison had developed a preference for Veuve Clicquot in Virginia, he informed his brother as he handed over Johanna’s credit card.
“So that’s what you did down there?” asked Lewyn when they returned to the car. “Guzzle Champagne and toast the little people?”
“I don’t know that I’d waste good Champagne on the ‘little people.’ I think sharing ideas with thinkers who are focused on improving our country is pretty much all I’ve been wanting to do since they let me wash off the finger paints in elementary school. Not that there’s anything wrong with art.”
Lewyn eyed his brother, who was driving. Harrison’s hands were not, he noted, in the sanctioned ten-and-two position.
“Well, I’m glad to see that college has broadened your worldview.”
“College has extended my worldview. College has deepened my worldview. I think that’s how it’s supposed to work. Is that how it’s working for you?”
Lewyn smiled. “I’d say so. I’ve made some interesting friends. I’ve found something I care about, intellectually.”
Harrison snorted.
“And I have a girlfriend.”
His brother flinched. Yes, there was pleasure, deep pleasure, in the moment. Lewyn saw Harrison struggle not to turn his head.
“Really.”
“Really. Thanks for your good wishes.”