“Who?” Ted said, turning down the radio. “What?”
“Vicki,” Brenda said. “Vicki!”
It wasn’t the sirens that woke her or the incredible rush of pavement beneath the ambulance’s tires, though Vicki could feel the speed, and the sirens were as upsetting as the screams of one of her children, hurt or terrified. What woke her was the smel . Something sharp, antiseptic.
Something right under her nose. Smel ing salts? Like she had fainted in a Victorian parlor? An unfamiliar young man, Josh’s age but with hair pul ed back in a ponytail (why such long hair on a guy? Vicki should have asked Castor, from the poker game, back when she had a chance), was gazing down at her, though he was blurry. Again, Vicki could only get one eye open.
“Vicki!” There, moving in to her limited field of vision, was her sister, and Vicki was relieved. Brenda. There was something important Vicki had wanted to ask Brenda al summer long, but she had been waiting for the right moment and, too, she had been afraid to ask, but she would ask now.
Before it was too late.
Vicki opened her mouth to speak, and Brenda said, “I’m sorry I brought up money. God, I am so sorry. Like what you need is more upset. And . . .
don’t kil me, but I cal ed Mom and Dad. They’re on their way up. Right now, tonight.”
Before it’s too late! Vicki thought. But her eyelids were being pul ed down like the shades on the windows of her bedroom at Number Eleven Shel Street. She was tired, she realized. Tired of fighting, tired of denying it: She was very sick. She was going to die. It had been mentioned in Vicki’s cancer support group that when you got close, fear vanished and peace settled in. Vicki was tired, she wanted to go back to where she’d been before she woke up, to the lost place and time, the nothingness. But resist! Stay with us a little longer! She had to ask Brenda something very important, the most important thing, but Vicki could not find her voice, her voice eluded her, it was gone, it had been stolen—and so Vicki just squeezed Brenda’s hand and thought the words and hoped that Brenda, as bril iant as she was, could intuit them.
I want you to take care of Blaine and Porter. I want you to take my little boys and raise them into men. Ted will be there, too, of course. He will do the ball games and the skiing and the fishing, he will talk to them about girls and drugs and alcohol, he will handle the guy stuff. But boys need a mother, a mommy, and I want that person to be you. You know me, I’m a list person, I always have been, even when I was pretending not to be. So here is the list. Remember everything, forget nothing: Kiss the kids when they fall down, read them stories, praise them when they share, teach them to be kind, to knock on a door before they enter a room, to put their toys away, to put the toilet seat down when they finish.
Play Chutes and Ladders, take them to museums and zoos and funny movies. Listen when they tell you something. Encourage them to sing, to build, to paint, to glue and tape, to call their grandmother. Teach them to cook one thing, make them eat grapes and carrots, and broccoli if you can, get them into swimming lessons, let them have sleepovers with friends where they watch Scooby-Doo and eat pizza and popcorn. Give them one gold dollar from the tooth fairy for each lost tooth. Make certain they don’t choke, drown, or ride their bike without a helmet. Volunteer in the classroom, always be on time picking them up and dropping them off, go to extra lengths with the Halloween costumes, the Christmas stockings, the valentines. Take them sledding and then make hot chocolate with marshmallows. Let them have an extra turn on the slide, notice when their pants get too short or their shoes too tight, hang up their artwork, let them have ice cream with jimmies when they’re good. Magic words, always, for everything. Do not buy a PlayStation. Spend your money, instead, on a trip to Egypt. They should see the Pyramids, the Sphinx. But most important, Brenda, tell them every single day how much I love them, even though I’m not there. I will be watching them, every soccer goal, every sand castle they build, every time they raise their hand in class with an answer right or wrong, I will be watching them. I will put my arms around them when they are sick, hurt, or sad. Make sure they can feel my arms around them! Someone once told me that having a child was like having your heart walk around outside of your body. They are my heart, Brenda, the heart I am leaving behind. Take care of my heart, Bren.
It’s a lot to ask, I know. It is the biggest, most important thing, and I am asking you because you are my sister. We are different, you and me, but if I can say one thing about you it’s that you know me, inside and out, better than Mom and Dad, better, even, than Ted. You are my sister, and I know you love my children and will take care of them like they’re your own. I wouldn’t ask anyone else to do this. To do this, there is only you.
Brenda was gazing down at her. Had she heard? Vicki released Brenda’s hand.
“Okay?” Vicki whispered.
“Okay,” Brenda said.
Brenda prayed, fast and furiously. Please, please, please, please, please. Ted was pacing the waiting room like a raving lunatic; they took Vicki upstairs for tests, but neither Ted nor Brenda had been al owed to accompany her. Melanie, in a moment of clarity that was previously unthinkable, volunteered to drive the kids back to ’Sconset, get them an ice cream at the market, pop in a Scooby-Doo video, and let them fal asleep in Ted and Vicki’s bed.
“Thank you,” Brenda said.
Brenda had cal ed her parents in the frantic moments before the ambulance arrived, with Vicki unconscious in Ted’s arms. What Brenda said to her mother was, “Vicki’s unconscious.”
El en Lyndon said, “We’re on our way.”
And Brenda, realizing that (a) it would be fruitless to dissuade her mother and (b) her mother and father were exactly what she needed right now, some backup, some help, some support, said, “Yes, okay.”
They wouldn’t be able to get to the island until the morning, though, and Brenda needed comfort now. There was a worm of guilt chewing a tunnel through Brenda’s brain. Brenda had brought up money; she had meant to initiate a conversation about the hundred and twenty-five thousand dol ars, and it was at that moment that Vicki lost consciousness. And it was now, ironical y, that Brenda realized money didn’t matter. Money was the last thing that mattered. (Why did human beings believe otherwise?) What mattered was family. What mattered was love.
