* * *
—
One afternoon, Dr. Dembia stopped Sylvie in the hospital corridor. “I’m trying to piece something together, and you might be able to help. William said you’d been talking to him about basketball.”
Sylvie nodded, pleased that the doctor was asking for her assistance. “He likes to talk about it. He’s…happier when he’s talking about basketball.”
“Yes,” the doctor said. “Why do you think basketball is so important to him?”
“Well, he’s played it since he was a kid. He was on his college team.” Sylvie thought about this. “Have you asked Kent?”
“He said that basketball was William’s first language. That he dribbled a ball more than he spoke when he was a kid.”
“His first language,” Sylvie repeated. That made sense. She had stumbled into speaking William’s first language with him, perhaps the only language he spoke fluently. That was why his pilot light had turned on.
“I do think that’s part of it.” The doctor nodded at a patient walking by but kept her eyes on Sylvie.
“He told me once that his parents didn’t love him,” Sylvie said. “I think they barely spoke to him when he was young.” Hearing the sentence out loud shocked her a little. Rose and Charlie had never stopped speaking to their girls when they were children. Sylvie tried to imagine what it would have been like to grow up in a home with no affection or laughter and envisioned a cold, echoing space. She saw a little boy dribbling a basketball in order to make a comforting, repetitive sound. Sylvie had the sensation she often had when she was reading a good novel and the story came together suddenly inside her, accompanied by a new understanding.
She said, “Basketball was the first thing in William’s life that loved him back. The only thing that loved him, for a long time.”
“Yes,” Dr. Dembia said, her eyes bright. She was a scientist, and Sylvie had just handed her a useful part of an equation. “That’s it. Yes.”
* * *
—
The day William asked Sylvie to write down his secrets, she left his room and noticed that her hands were shaking. What had happened in that room was how she’d always thought church should feel. The air seemed to break open, and what passed between them felt sacred.
Sylvie usually caught the bus right in front of the hospital, but that afternoon she walked to the library. She wanted to feel the wind on her skin. She broke into a jog a few times, because her body craved motion, and she liked that mid-stride both of her feet were off the ground for a split second. That night at Julia’s apartment, she whispered to Emeline and Cecelia that she needed to talk to them. They understood that she meant without Julia, so when they got into the sculptor’s car after a meal of curry and samosas, Cecelia drove a few blocks away and then pulled over. Mrs. Ceccione was watching Izzy; it was just the three sisters in the car. Sylvie and Cecelia turned their bodies so they could both see Emeline in the back seat.
“What is it?” Emeline said. “Is William okay?”
Sylvie told them everything William had told her. The only thing she left out was his comment that he wouldn’t have been able to share his secrets with anyone other than her. That sentence warmed Sylvie’s insides and belonged to her alone.
“Oh my heavens,” Emeline said, when Sylvie was done. She was quiet for a minute. “That was so brave of him.”
“I can’t believe he had a sister,” Cecelia said.
The three women looked at one another with shared wonder. A hidden, lost sister was momentous. Sylvie said, “The doctor, who I really like, told him that to be well, he couldn’t keep these things inside him anymore. She gave him a mantra: No bullshit and no secrets.”
“I have to tell you something.” The words burst out of Emeline as if from a blocked tap. “Part of why I’ve felt so bad for William,” she said, “is that I’ve been depressed sometimes. Over the last few years. I’ve even had those kinds of thoughts.”
The car windows were closed. It was a gusty October night; the wind rattled branches above their heads, making it sound like the trees were clapping. “No, you haven’t.” Cecelia’s voice was sharp. “Don’t say that. It isn’t true.”
“I wouldn’t have done anything,” Emeline said. “I promise.”
“Why would you hide that from us?” Sylvie said. “Why wouldn’t you tell us you felt sad?”
Emeline turned her face toward the car window. “I’ve been afraid to tell you. But William’s doctor is right. We shouldn’t have any secrets.”
Cecelia studied her twin’s profile. She was clearly surprised to hear that there were any secrets between them. “Emmie, you can tell us anything.”
“I have a crush on someone. A big crush.”
Sylvie and Cecelia both brought their hands to their chests, which was what Rose did when she was told big news. Julia did this too.
Emeline’s eyes were closed now. Her head was still turned away, as if she feared a physical blow. “It’s not a man, though. It’s Josie, the woman who works with me in the daycare.”
“Josie?” Cecelia said.
“I was sure I was wrong and that how I felt just meant I really liked her, because I do. We work wonderfully together, and she makes me laugh. The babies follow her around. But my heart beats faster when I’m near her, and I want to kiss her so badly.”
Sylvie’s body was stiff with surprise. She tried to think of what to say.
“I know,” Emeline said, with sorrow.
Sylvie had never known a lesbian personally. There was a lady who rode her bicycle around the neighborhood wearing a baseball cap, and it was rumored that she lived with another woman, but she never came into the library, so Sylvie had never seen her up close. She thought of lesbians as being somehow hard and manly, and Emeline was the opposite of that. She was the sweetest and softest of the sisters.
“Oh, Emmie,” Cecelia said. “Are you sure?”
Emeline’s eyes filled with tears. Sylvie reached into the back seat to touch her younger sister’s knee. “We love you,” she said. “This is just…unexpected, that’s all.”
“I have no idea if Josie likes me in that way,” Emeline said. “She probably doesn’t.”
“Mom would be horrified,” Cecelia said. This was undoubtedly true; Rose was Catholic all the way to her bones and had said several disparaging or insulting things about gay people in front of the girls over the course of their lives. A terrible new disease that seemed to afflict mostly gay men had been identified recently, and this news story disgusted and fascinated Rose in equal measure.
“I know. It’s the first time I’ve been happy that she moved away.”
The relief in Emeline’s eyes made the other women laugh.
“I thought if I told you, you would hate me. But William told you awful things, and I only feel sympathy for him.” She hesitated. “I won’t be able to have babies, though,” she whispered. “I won’t be able to be a mother.”
Sylvie and Cecelia traded the quickest of glances, to share their surprise at what they’d just learned and their grief at the last statement. William didn’t want to be a father, and Emeline couldn’t have what she most wanted, to be a mother. “You can adopt, maybe?” Sylvie said. She felt another small fissure inside herself; another piece of life was separating the sisters from the dreams they’d once held for themselves and one another.