Little Sister (2 page)

Brewster waved it off and threaded his way back across the room to his wife.

“He’s an all right guy,” said Mike Belack.

“He’s been great to me,” said Beth. “He really encouraged me when I needed the push. Not everyone would have done that.”

“No. Especially since you were his pride and joy at the firm.”

Beth smiled. “Hasn’t this been a lovely party, Mike?”

“Yes, it has,” he said, squeezing her gently around the waist. “Do you want a grape?”

Beth shook her head.

“You know, I’m glad to see you looking so happy. There were times I thought that between finishing this wing and starting the new business, you were on the verge of a collapse.”

“There were times I thought so, too,” she admitted, “although I’m sure that in looking back on it, I’ll always regard it as one of the happiest times in my life.”

“Well, of course,” said Mike. “You met me. What more could anyone ask?”

Beth made a face and punched him lightly, but she smiled to herself, acknowledging the truth of what he said.

Mike popped a wedge of cheese into his mouth and looked thoughtfully around the room as he ate. Beth reached onto his plate and took a piece for herself.

“I just ran into Maxine over by the dessert table,” Mike said. “Let me tell you, if there was a lampshade in this room, she’d be wearing it on her head.”

Beth laughed. Maxine had been her assistant at the old firm and had allowed herself to be recruited when Beth struck out on her own. She was now Beth’s assistant, secretary, chief troubleshooter, and sole full-time employee. She was also a model of tact and efficiency who gave the fledgling company a polished veneer for prospective clients. The idea of Maxine’s tying one on at the party tickled Beth’s fancy. “No one deserves to celebrate more than Maxine,” she said. “Sometimes I think Brewster regrets losing her more than me.”

“Well, it’s been a great night,” said Mike. “But what do you say we continue the celebration privately, at your house?”

Beth looked around the room and nodded. “It sounds good to me. Besides, I’ve just got to get off my feet.”

“Good,” said Mike. “Let’s say our good-byes and be on our way.”

He put his plate down on a nearby table, and hand in hand they made their way toward the door, stopping every so often to say good night. Near the door they passed Maxine, who was holding two men spellbound with her tipsy charm. At the sight of them Maxine broke away and gave her boss an affectionate hug.

“Thanks for everything,” Beth whispered. “See you tomorrow.”

“Let’s walk,” said Mike as they donned their coats and stepped out into the crisp night air. Beth nodded agreement and linked her arm through his.

“You were a smash,” he said, and kissed her cold cheek.

“Thanks.” She glanced over at him as they strode along in the direction of her house. The streetlights brightened and then darkened his distinctive profile. She felt a surge of happiness, having him with her to share this magical evening. The streets of the city were quiet, emptied by the cold and the lateness of the hour. The night seemed both peaceful and enchanted to her.

“What are you thinking about?” he asked. “You’re awfully quiet.”

“Just feeling lucky,” she said. “And happy.”

Mike pulled her arm closer to his body. “We are lucky.”

He uses “we” so comfortably, she thought. It was typical of his confidence, his optimism. Although she liked to think that meeting him was a small miracle or even destiny, if there were such a thing, she was still reluctant to bank on “we.” How could two people who were such different types have hit it off” so quickly, she wondered. He had an open, freewheeling approach to life, and he took their love as something natural, albeit wonderful. I have to poke at it, prod it, doubt it, she thought.

But, we
do
fit, she reminded herself, with a satisfied smile. We go together.

“Hold that smile,” he said. “We’re almost home.”

They turned a comer and then walked, arm in arm, up the steps of Beth’s town house, which was one in a row of carefully restored old brick houses on a quiet, tree-lined street. Mike shivered as Beth fiddled with the keys. “It’s cold out here when you’re not moving,” he said. “January, ugh.”

“We’ll be warm in a minute.” She opened the door and stepped into the foyer, and the warmth of the house seemed to embrace her. It was the first house she had ever owned, and she had bought it at a low price, for it had been in a sad state of neglect and disrepair when she found it. She had planned the renovations and worked side by side with the workmen and often long into the night after they were gone, both to save money and to have the satisfaction of transforming the place with her own labor. It gave her a little feeling of pride every time she walked into the home she had made for herself.

Mike took her coat, and Beth went in and turned on the lamps in the living room. “Do you want a nightcap?” Beth called out to him as he hung their coats in the hall closet.

“Just some club soda for me. I’m on call early tomorrow.”

Beth poured them both some club soda and handed him one as he came into the room.

“What do you say,” said Mike, wrapping an arm around her, “we take these upstairs, where we can be more comfortable?”

Beth smiled at him. “Sounds good to me. Just let me close up for the night.”

As Beth went into the kitchen to check the back door and the windows, Mike looked around the room. “You know,” he called out to her, “this wouldn’t be a bad room to have a wedding, provided it wasn’t too large.”

Beth, who had turned on the back floodlights to check the garden, snapped down the switch and did not answer for a second.

Mike appeared in the kitchen doorway, his head cocked to one side. “Of course, we’d have to provide a lot of extra ashtrays.”

Beth exhaled slowly. Her heart was beating very hard. “I’ve never thought about it,” she said, although this was not precisely true.

He had mentioned weddings before. Whenever he did, she felt a funny combination of happy excitement and, at the same time, a little ratlike scurry of fear through her intestines. And there it was again. You are twenty-eight years old, she reminded herself, and this is the first man whom you could imagine being married to. Most of the men in her past had found her difficult, competitive, prickly. She had been called all that, and much more, before the door slammed and then were gone from her life. With Mike it had been different. Right from the start he had accepted her moods and applauded her accomplishments, as if they were the most natural thing in the world. With Mike she could bloom. She was sure of it.

But so much could go wrong between people. A marriage could turn so ugly and frightening. She knew that it could. She had seen it firsthand. But if you didn’t chance it, didn’t try…

“Never did, eh?” he asked in a jaunty tone. “Well, think about it.”

Beth nodded and squeezed him tightly. “I will.”

“I knew it,” said Mike with a grimace as the demanding ring of the phone shattered the air. “Well-wishers no doubt.”

“Let’s not answer it,” said Beth. “Whoever it is can wait.”

Reluctantly he let her go. “It could be the hospital.”

Beth nodded and walked over to the phone. “I guess this is what the life of a doctor’s wife is like,” she said teasingly. She blushed as she said it. Then she picked up the phone.

For a few moments she just listened to the voice at the other end. Mike watched as her normally mobile face with its lovely green eyes and fine features stiffened into a tight, expressionless mask. She made him think of a boat, clipping along with the wind, that hits a hidden rock and begins to sink without warning. He could not understand, from the monosyllables she spoke, what the call was about.

“All right,” Beth said at last. “I’ll be there tomorrow. Thanks for calling.”

Beth replaced the phone on the hook and stood staring at it.

“What’s the matter?” Mike asked. “Trouble?”

Beth raised her eyes from the phone and looked at Mike with a dull, distant gaze. Then she cleared her throat. “That was my aunt,” she said. “My father died today, of a heart attack.”

“Oh, baby, oh, no,” said Mike. “Come here. I’m so sorry.”

Beth backed away from him and waved off his concern. “No, no, it’s all right.” She frowned and bit her lower lip. “I’m—I’ll have to go up to Maine tomorrow.”

“Darling, what can I do?” Mike asked, coming over and putting his arms around her.

Beth shook her head absently. “I’ll have to pack. Maybe you could call the airlines for me. I need to fly to Portland tomorrow.”

“Sure I will. But talk to me. What’s going on? Are you okay?”

Beth sighed. “Yeah.”

“Darling, you should go ahead and cry if you want. Don’t hold it in,” he said.

“I don’t feel like crying,” she said. “Mike, could you just make that call for me? I’d better go up and pack.”

“Okay,” said Mike, watching her quizzically as she turned away from him and headed for the staircase. He picked up the receiver and quickly dialed the airline. It seemed to take forever to get a reservations clerk on the line, but he finally succeeded.

“Have you got any direct flights from Philadelphia to Portland, Maine, tomorrow morning?” he asked.

The agent informed him that he would need a connecting flight through Boston and left him hanging on the line while she checked the possible connections. Mike cocked an ear toward the upper floor of the house while he waited, expecting to hear the muffled sound of sobs from the rooms above, but all he heard was the shush and slam of drawers opening and closing.

The agent came back on the line and gave him the flight times. Mike completed the arrangements and then hurried upstairs to the master bedroom.

Beth’s suitcase was open on the bed, and she was methodically, if somewhat listlessly, choosing what to put inside it.

“It’s all set,” Mike said. “Tomorrow morning at ten. You change in Boston.”

“Thanks,” she said.

“Beth,” he said, “why don’t I come with you? I can arrange for someone to cover for me.”

Beth looked at the two sweaters she was holding as if she were weighing them in her hands. She put one of them in the suitcase and returned the other one to the drawer. Then she looked up at Mike with confusion in her eyes. “I don’t think I’ll need both of them, do you?”

“What?”

“Both sweaters. I’ll be gone only a few days. What do you think?”

“I think one will be enough,” he said gently. “You know, it might help to have someone with you. I hate to think of you being all alone up there.”

“Well, I won’t be all alone. It’s all right, Mike. But thank you anyway. My sister is there. And my aunt and uncle.”

“You never mentioned that you had a sister, Beth,” he said, a little surprised.

“I didn’t?” Beth asked.

“I thought your father was it.”

“Yes, Francie. She’s much younger than I am. I guess she’s about fourteen by now. I hardly know her.”

“How long has it been since you’ve seen your family?” Mike asked.

Beth wrested a set of thermal underwear from the bottom of the stacking drawers in her closet. “It’s bitter up there,” she said, folding them into the suitcase. “I haven’t been back in a long time. Years now. Since my mother died, I guess. And that was, let’s see, about eight years ago. So I haven’t seen Francie since she was, well, pretty young.”

“Wow,” said Mike.

“Wow what? What’s the wow?”

“It’s a long time not to see your family. That’s all.”

“I suppose so,” said Beth.

“Take some turtlenecks,” he advised her as she stood helplessly staring into a bureau drawer. Beth nodded gratefully.

“What happened to your mother anyway? How did she die?”

“She was in an accident,” said Beth. “I’d rather not talk about it.”

“Okay.”

“I was pretty close to her. But my father and I never really got along. We never did. Anyway, I was up there after my mother died, and he and I had a huge fight. And then, well, that was it, really. There was the occasional call or letter. It suited us both that way.”

Mike suspected that there might be pain behind the offhand explanation, but he could tell from the closed look on Beth’s face that he should pursue it no further for the moment.

“What about Francie?” he asked. “What happens to her now?”

Beth, who was stuffing socks into the corners of her suitcase, made an exasperated sound. “Why should you be so concerned about Francie?”

“I’m not concerned. I’m just asking,” he protested. “Don’t get mad.”

Beth shrugged. “Sorry. You’re right. I have an aunt and uncle who live up there in Oldham. That was my aunt May calling about my father. She’s my father’s sister. My uncle James is a minister there. They’re older, but they’re very nice people. Francie will go live with them. They’ve had two kids of their own, so they’re happy to take her. There, that looks like all I’ll need.”

“Beth,” said Michael, who was seated at the edge of the bed, “come here and sit down.”

“Mike, will you water the plants while I’m gone?”

“Of course.”

“I hope I won’t be gone too long. I have to get back to work. As it is, this couldn’t have happened at a worse time.”

Mike grimaced at this remark and then tried to hide it, but Beth noticed it. She sighed and seemed to search for something to say.

“Look,” she said, “I know what you’re thinking.”

Mike shook his head. “I’m sorry. I know you’re upset, but I’m not used to seeing you like this. You seem so stiff and, I don’t know, detached. And I know that’s not you. You’re not an unfeeling person. You’re the farthest thing from it.”

Beth frowned and jerked the zipper shut on her bag. Finally she said, “I’m sure you wouldn’t feel this way if it were your father, but we all don’t feel the same about our families. I can’t help the way I feel. I know you don’t understand, but I can’t explain it to you. Not right now.”

“All right, all right. I’m not trying to judge you. Believe me. Come and sit down here.”

“There’s the wake and the funeral. Then I’ll have to go through the stuff in the house and get Francie settled in with my aunt and uncle, and then I’ll be back. I figure three or four days. Five at the most. God, I hope it doesn’t take longer than that. I won’t be able to stand it.” For a moment there was a note of real dread in her voice.