Sisters of Heart and Snow

by Margaret Dilloway

  “He wants me back in, you know,” Drew says.

  Rachel’s eyebrows shoot up. “So he can make you play tambourine for the rest of your natural life?”

  “No. For viola.”

  They park on the street a couple blocks away. Chase gets out. “Meet us back here, ten o’clock, okay?” Rachel directs him.

  He salutes her and races off.

  Rachel shuts off the car and they sit for a second in the semi-dark, the yellow streetlamps the only light, the moon covered by clouds. Children scream and bass thumps out from the live band. “You believe him?” Rachel asks quietly, and Drew automatically clenches her hands. You’re such a bad judge of character, Drew. Be careful.

  “Yeah.” Drew gets out and shuts the door. Rachel follows, beeping the alarm. “They’re going to be on Jimmy Kimmel. It’s real.”

  “Well, maybe you should do that, then,” Rachel says neutrally. She looks at her cell phone, scrolls to a picture of Quincy, puts her finger on it, then shuts it off. “It’s what you always wanted, isn’t it?”

  Drew feels a pull in her gut. Not for herself, for her sister. “Are you okay?” She’s been acting distant all week, ever since the morning when the kids made cookies. Drew puts it all together only now—she herself has been mostly thinking about Alan and possible jobs, and thought Rachel was still down about their mother and Killian. They’d gone to visit their mother together, and that was the time Rachel had shown the most animation. “Is everything okay with Quincy?” Drew asks with a spurt of intuition. Rachel hasn’t talked about Quincy for days. She usually can’t go five minutes without bringing up her daughter.

  “Yeah. Everything’s fine. Come on.” Rachel smiles brightly at her, walking ahead.

  It’s cooler tonight, for California, but Drew didn’t bring a jacket. She never does. The wind stings her skin, and she shivers.

  “Are you nervous?” Rachel asks Drew as they walk across the parking lot. He’d said six-thirty, in the food booth area.

  “Hell yeah, I’m nervous. I’m meeting his kids. Isn’t that a huge event?” She’s already seen Alan three times. Warned him she didn’t really live in this town. E-mailed back and forth, and talked on the phone more. And so far, only that one kiss that Drew can’t get out of her mind. “Aren’t you supposed to be engaged or something before you meet someone else’s kids?” Alan told her he’d been out with two other women since his wife’s passing. Drew asked him why those hadn’t worked.

  He’d thought about it for a minute. “I saw that these relationships wouldn’t go anywhere,” he’d answered, “so I didn’t feel right about continuing to see them.”

  “They probably won’t start off by calling you Mommy.” Rachel links her arm through Drew’s. “Don’t worry. It’s a carnival. It’s casual. Not such a big deal in a group, I don’t think.” She shrugs. “Or maybe he does this all the time, and he’s completely screwing up his girls.”

  “Thanks. Thanks. I needed that.” Drew nudges her sister with her shoulder. Yesterday, she stopped by to see Alan at the library, and he’d come out from behind the counter to talk. He wanted to show her some new titles they’d got in, asked for her help in selecting books about music for a display. Afterward, when Alan went into his office, the model-pretty librarian, Brooke, shook her head. “I’ve never seen him talk that much the entire time he’s been here,” she remarked to Drew.

  “You have to think about that. Remember. Children come first.” Rachel echoes what Drew said the other day, though Drew doesn’t think Rachel realizes it. “You don’t want to be the one his girls have to talk about in therapy.”

  They make their way across the brightly lit concrete path, pausing to watch an artist creating a 3-D chalk picture of a waterfall. It feels like they’re standing on the edge of it, looking down into the whitewater. “Wow,” Rachel breathes. Drew almost swears that a drop of water hit her. She digs out a dollar and throws it into the artist’s donation box. Rachel repeats the gesture.

  On the lawn, children race around with dripping caramel apples and ice cream cones. Beyond are a couple of rides, a Ferris wheel and a swing ride. An eighties tribute band thumps out a-ha on a small stage (“Take On Me,” Drew remembers). A few portable lights cast everyone in an orange glow.

  They walk through the crowd of people watching the band, sitting on blankets or standing or dancing. Drew hears a dissonance in someone’s guitar and flinches. Maybe she ought to tell them how to fix it.

  “Don’t let him crawl on the grass. God. Can’t you do anything I ask? Use your head,” a woman’s voice snaps. Drew looks down and sees a baby in a leopard costume trying to crawl off a plaid blanket. The owner of the voice stands on the other side of the blanket, a woman about Drew’s age, wearing a leopard outfit that used less material than the baby’s, impatiently sucking on a cigarette. A red-haired teenaged girl in a Robin costume scoops up the baby. Her eyes meet Drew’s briefly. It’s Chase’s girlfriend.

  The girl looks away. Drew doubts she recognized her. “Can I have ten dollars, Mom?”

  The mother hands her a twenty. “Only if you take your brother with you. Buy him something to eat, too.”

  Drew wonders what on earth this carnival sells that a baby can eat. The girl nods, walks off, the baby cradled on her hip like an expert. The woman blows smoke, squints at Drew. Her face is hard, all angles, wrinkles on her upper lip from the smoking. Drew wrenches her gaze off the woman.

  Rachel tugs on her arm. “The food’s this way.” They keep walking. Drew says nothing to Rachel. No wonder the girl’s the way she is, she thinks to herself.

  She sees Alan’s girls before she sees him, recognizes their white-blond hair and light eyebrows from the pictures. Drew stops, her heels indenting the grass, as if they won’t be able to spot her if she stands still.

  They could almost be twins, except one’s slightly taller than the other. A light illuminates them and their costumes, one in Belle from Beauty and the Beast and the older one in a Wonder Woman. They’re standing by the cotton candy booth, watching the attendant swirl a poofy cloud of pink onto a paper stick. “Here you go!” Alan hands them the candy. He has no warnings of how they should be neat, or keep it off their faces. Drew smiles. She hates it when parents ruin the simple joy of a treat by warning the kids to be tidy. Once when she and Rachel were little, their parents bought them ice cream cones while on a vacation. Drew’s ice cream got all over her face. Chocolate—the messiest kind. Both parents scolded her for so long that Drew had never wanted a cone again.

  “Thank you, Daddy,” the little girls chorus sweetly, a faint trace of English accent in their tones.

  Alan sees Drew, waves at her. Drew lifts her hand but feels a small surge of panic. Oh my God. He points at Drew and the two little girls grin and run straight for her, like miniature football players. He follows at a close clip and Drew wonders if she’ll possibly be able to keep up with them all. What if they run in different directions? Poor Alan. He looks good tonight, Drew thinks, wearing a soft-looking brown leather jacket, khakis, and a T-shirt. Nothing flashy, nothing hip, but comfortable. A leather-bound book, Drew thinks. The one you want to keep to read again. That’s what he reminds her of. He even smells like books. He introduces himself to Rachel, shakes her hand.

  “Are you Dad’s friend Drew?” Wonder Woman asks her. Already pink candy sticks all over her face in tufts and melted spots.

  Drew nods. “I am.”

  Wonder Woman points at herself. “I’m Audrey. This is Lauren.” Named after Audrey Hepburn and Lauren Bacall, Alan has explained to her.

  Lauren curtseys in her Belle costume, gold slippers peeking out from under the skirt. Drew’s glad to see neither bothered with a wig, their blond hair shining. “Pleased to meet you.”

  Drew stoops to the girls’ height without thinking. She holds out her hand and first Audrey, then Lauren, shakes it. Their hands are tiny and warm. “Ple
ased to meet you, too. I’m honored to be in the presence of Wonder Woman and Belle.”

  Lauren tiptoes to Drew. “Know why I picked Belle?” she whispers. Drew shakes her head. “She likes books. So do I.”

  “I bet your daddy brings you lots of books. What’s your favorite?”

  “Junie B. Jones.”

  “Whoa. That’s a chapter book.” Drew whistles through her teeth, impressed. Quincy had read those in first grade. Drew bought her a set one Christmas.

  “I read them myself,” Lauren says proudly.

  “What a smart girl,” Rachel says.

  Lauren nods, suddenly shy. She steps back behind Alan’s leg. They have Alan’s nose in miniature, a slightly upturned version, but both have a heart-shaped face Drew assumes comes from their mother.

  Audrey studies Rachel. “That your sister?”

  Drew nods. “My big sister.”

  “But you’re bigger than she is,” Lauren says. “That’s not right. She’s your little sister. Like mine.” She puts Audrey in a headlock, knocking the smaller girl off balance for a moment.

  “I’m thinking of enrolling her in judo,” Alan says with a laugh, prying Lauren’s arm off her sister. “She’s a natural.”

  Audrey grins and holds up the sticky candy. “Want some? We share.”

  Rachel bends forward, to Drew’s surprise. “Yes, please. Thanks. You have such good manners.” She takes a small chunk. “I love cotton candy.”

  Audrey holds the cone out to Drew. Drew pinches off a piece. She hasn’t had it since childhood. The sugar crystals crunch, then melt in her mouth. Caramelized sugar. Sort of like the crackle crust on top of a crème brûlée. Her fingers are sticky and she sucks them, which doesn’t help much, and wipes her hand off on her jeans. Maybe mothers are just never clean, she thinks. She minds this far less than she would have thought. “Thank you.”

  “Daddy?” Lauren points to a giant inflatable slide. It’s higher than the roof of the rec center. “Will you go on that with us?” She holds Alan’s left hand.

  “Sure.” Alan smiles down at Drew with an expression she can’t read. A bit closed off. Guarded. Is it because the girls are here? She wants to kiss him, but of course does not. “You don’t have to.”

  “You’re going to have to take off your shoes.” Audrey’s little hand slips into Drew’s. Audrey. Drew’s heart skips.

  Drew looks at Alan. “Sure, I’ll go.”

  “I’ll catch up with you later,” Rachel says. “Tom’s meeting me by the corndogs.”

  Drew shoots her a panicked look. That’s not a group thing, then. But Rachel makes a shooing gesture. Go. Audrey pulls on her, tries to run. “Hurry up, Drew-lady!” she shouts. “We don’t want to be late! Pick me up!”

  “That would be terrible.” Drew picks up the girl. She’s heavier than she looks. She runs across the grass to the slide.

  “We beat them!” Audrey says triumphantly. She hands Drew a wad of tickets. “Now we go.”

  They kick off their shoes and climb up the slide steps, which has a rope ladder to help you get up to the top. The girl climbs like a monkey, Drew much more slowly. She looks down and sees Alan and Lauren a few parties below them. Alan is frowning, concentrating on his climbing. She hopes he’s not mad that they didn’t wait. She was just trying to do what the girl wanted.

  “Come on,” Audrey yells from the top, and Drew makes it all the way up. A teenager in a red shirt tells Drew to sit down on a felt mat, and Audrey sits in front of her. Drew puts her arm around the girl—she’s so small—and peers down. Wow—it’s steeper than she thought. Before she can think anything else, they’re sliding down, fast, landing against the soft bumpers.

  “That was fun!” Audrey stands up and scoots off the end onto the grass. “Let’s go again.”

  “Hold on.” Drew waits for Alan and Lauren, who fly down. Neither of them smiles.

  Lauren gets off the slide and runs over and punches Audrey in the arm. “Why didn’t you wait for us?”

  “Ow!” Audrey pulls back. “You’re slow.”

  “Lauren, no hitting,” Alan says sternly.

  “Sorry,” Drew says.

  “It’s fine,” Alan says with a smile, but he’s terse.

  Drew leans in next to his ear, even as Lauren glares. “Is something wrong?”

  Alan shakes his head. “I can’t talk about it right now.” He looks pointedly at his daughters. He bends and helps Lauren with her shoes. Audrey takes Drew’s hand again and she double ties the pink laces of Audrey’s glittery sneakers.

  “What would you like to do now?” Drew asks brightly, standing. “The jump house?”

  “We decide,” Lauren says. Her arms are crossed. “Not you.”

  Drew rocks back on her heels. Oh. Lauren must feel left out. “What would you like to do, Lauren?”

  Lauren takes Alan’s hand. “She should get her own tickets, Daddy. She’s using too many of ours.”

  Drew blushes so hotly she feels like she’s almost knocked off her feet. “Oh. Sure.”

  “It’s not necessary,” Alan says, but Drew’s already walking to the ticket booth.

  “You guys don’t need to wait. I’ll catch up,” she calls over her shoulder.

  “Are you sure?” Alan holds a hand of each of his girls, and Drew thinks he looks as relieved as Lauren does.

  She waves and walks away.

  MIYANOKOSHI FORTRESS / TAKATO TOWN

  SHINANO PROVINCE

  HONSHU, JAPAN

  Spring 1181

  What’s this one?” Tomoe scratched a symbol into the dirt with a stick. The dry, hot wind whipping about nearly wiped out the lesson before it began. Her throat itched in the dust.

  When were the rains going to return? A drought had come to Japan. Animals dying because the farmers could not water them. People succumbing not only from lack of food, but from disease as well.

  Every morning Tomoe woke and stared at the horizon, looking for rain clouds and seeing nothing but wavering lines of heat. For once she was glad they lived in such an isolated outpost. Illnesses had trouble reaching them here in the mountains. And they were close enough to the scant snow that they still had water.

  Shaking away the dark thoughts, Tomoe scratched the symbol again into the dirt. “Come now.”

  The three-year-old boy squatting next to her did not answer. He dimpled his chubby cheeks into a smile. “I don’t remember,” he said in childish singsong.

  “It’s ki,” Tomoe said, deliberately getting it wrong.

  “Ka,” he corrected.

  “I knew you knew it!” Tomoe reached over and tickled him. Yoshitaka, the son of Yoshinaka, doubled over in giggles. He looked exactly like his father had when he was a boy, the eyebrows sticking up at angles toward his temples, the merry twinkle of trouble always in his eyes. Already, his future was secure. Yoshinaka had arranged for his son to be betrothed to his cousin Yoritomo’s daughter. Tomoe tickled Yoshitaka some more, kissing his cheeks for good measure.

  “Stop! I can’t breathe!” he said.

  Yamabuki paused at her laundry-hanging, her oversized belly making her off balance. “Tomoe, he’s going to pee his pants!”

  Tomoe raised her hands. “I’ve already stopped.” Little Yoshitaka picked up a wooden sword lying in the dirt and swung it at Tomoe’s legs. She hopped over it effortlessly. The boy was stocky and strong. Already he could climb trees like Tomoe, fire arrows a short distance, and ride Demon as though the horse was a docile pony.

  “I chase you down, Kiyomori Taira,” the boy said firmly, his hands on his hips. “Yah!”

  “See if you can catch me first.” Tomoe took off at a run, the boy chasing her and giggling.

  For the first time since she could remember, Tomoe hoped that war would never come. And if it came, let it be far from them. Leaning in, she once again tried
to get Yoshitaka to focus on the lettering. “Tell me what this is, Yoshi-chan.”

  He shrugged, concentrating on his fingers. He’d been trying to snap them for weeks and couldn’t yet make a sound. “Show me again, Tomoe?”

  Tomoe showed him. Yoshitaka screwed up his face. “I cannot!” He stamped his feet. “Ugh. Ugh. Ugh.”

  “You know what you need?” Tomoe said. “Another hug.” He tried to jump away, but she hugged him until he stopped kicking. At the line, Yamabuki smiled ruefully and shook out a laundered kimono.

  Yamabuki had long ago given up any pretensions of being a lady. But for her still-weak appearance, she might have been any peasant woman. Her skin had never lost its pallor, almost as though it naturally lacked pigment, like a turnip. Her large belly loomed in profile as Yamabuki leaned over the laundry basket. She was pregnant with her second child. It was easier this time, and Tomoe was glad.

  “You should be teaching him with ink, on paper,” Yamabuki admonished gently.

  “I’ll leave that to his tutor. I don’t want to waste the materials with my small teachings.” Tomoe put her forehead against the boy’s and blew air through her lips, buzzing them. He chortled.

  This boy would have to be well educated. Someday, little Yoshitaka could inherit much land. Yoshinaka hoped the boy would also inherit from his cousin Yoritomo’s leadership position by marrying his daughter. But Yoshinaka’s ambitions were endless.

  Tomoe was content with all they had now, land or no land. Babies were such a joy. At the sight of Yoshitaka’s wrinkled, scarlet, pointy newborn head, covered in sticky afterbirth, she had expected to feel disgust. Instead she found herself eagerly holding her arms out to Yamabuki, who was whiter than ever, the blue-green vein on her forehead throbbing.

  When Yamabuki went into labor, all bygones of that day Yamabuki had called Tomoe her servant were forgotten. Perhaps that was the mark of a sister, Tomoe thought. You could be angry, but still be there for one another when needed.

  And now that baby was almost four, in the blink of an eye.