“Actually, I’ve always assumed that he didn’t want to leave me.”
I heard myself say this, and it came as something of a surprise: another thing I hadn’t quite put together. Like so many things these days.
“Don’t be silly. You don’t need looking after. You have a mother. You have an excellent mother.”
I shook my head. “I have a once-excellent mother who is not all that interested in being a mother right now. Which is completely understandable given that she has been raising children for thirty-four years. I’m not sure how into it I’d be, on the second go-round.”
“She is devoted to all of us. Equally.”
“Oh, Harrison,” I laughed. “Don’t even.”
“You’re mistaken,” he insisted, but he was good enough to leave it there. For a moment neither of us spoke. And then he asked me what it was I wanted to talk about.
“Stella Western, mainly,” I said, without further preamble.
He crossed his arms. “Aha,” he said.
“This is a name you are familiar with.”
“Very familiar, yes. Stella Western is someone who has caused us all a good deal of grief.”
I smiled. “Well, not me. She’s caused me no grief at all, that I know of. Exactly what grief has she caused you?”
I watched him. He was regarding his juice bottle with outright hostility, as if it, too, had offended him. His jaw was set and his eyes were nearly closed. He was looking just a little bit … old, I realized. Or was it only the hairline, beginning to alter? And the lines running across his forehead, deep now as he glared, a spattering of makeup still along his forehead, which was just like the forehead of our father, in photographs. I could see him working through the options: truth and consequences versus pride and consequences.
“Phoebe,” he said, turning to me, and this time, for the first time, without any of his prior condescension. “It’s very difficult to know when to share information like this. It might change the way you feel about things. I’m not cavalier about it. I care about you. You are my little sister.”
“No,” I said. “I’m not, really. You should try thinking of me as your own age. I mean, exactly your own age. Like, down to the minute. See if that changes things.”
He frowned at me. “All right,” he said, after a minute. “I wasn’t aware you knew about that.”
“Well, now you are. So can we move this along? What grief has Stella Western caused our family?”
Harrison sighed. “There were some legal issues. Mom needed help. She confided in me. This was … well, a long time ago. Just after Dad passed away.”
I had never had much love for this term, at least under the relevant circumstances. There was not one thing in the violent, deliberate, murderous collision of Salo Oppenheimer and his fellow passengers and their airplane with the South Tower of the World Trade Center that earned the ethereal, dreamy “pass away.” But I let it go.
“What kind of legal troubles?”
Harrison shrugged. “Just … nothing to concern yourself with.”
“Jesus, Harrison. I know they were involved. Stella Western and Dad.”
Now he was staring at me. For a moment he was truly speechless. “And you learned about all of this how?” he finally said.
“Do you mean, which of our naughty siblings decided to enlighten the baby?”
“Actually, that is not what I mean. As far as I’m aware, I’m the only one of the siblings who knows anything about this.”
I laughed at him. I had to. And besides, it felt ridiculously good.