Sylvie secretly thought it was Julia’s fault that she’d ended up in this odd predicament with her brother-in-law; her sister knew about the footnotes, knew the manuscript included William’s personal thoughts and questions, and she’d asked Sylvie to read it anyway. If Sylvie hadn’t read his manuscript, none of this would have happened. The day after she’d cried on the bench beside William, she lied to her older sister for the first time. She told Julia that her fictional new apartment didn’t have a phone and that, no, Julia couldn’t visit her there, because it was too small and messy. “I’m fine,” Sylvie had insisted to Julia over and over during those three months, even though she knew her sister could tell she was lying. That lie chipped away at both of them every time Sylvie uttered it.
Sylvie’s college graduation took place in the stuffy community college auditorium on a Tuesday morning in June. She told her sisters not to come, because the ceremony would be hot and boring. And anti-climactic, she thought, when she threw her cardboard mortarboard in a garbage can on her walk home. Sylvie was now a college graduate, which was what her mother had always wanted, but her mother no longer cared. Sylvie didn’t even tell Rose that she’d officially graduated. She didn’t want to hear her mother sigh at the news; Sylvie knew Rose had lost faith, and perhaps interest, in the finish line she’d set for her daughters when they were young.
Three months after Sylvie moved into her studio, on an August afternoon, Ernie walked into the library and into the row where she was shelving young-adult literature.
Sylvie stared; she hadn’t seen him since Charlie’s wake. She hadn’t seen any of her boys since then. She’d been walking the library rows alone for all this time. She managed to say, “Well, look what the cat dragged in.”
“I’ve been thinking about you,” he said. “Been busy. I just graduated—I’m officially an electrician.”
“Congratulations. I graduated too.”
They smiled at each other, and she took in his wavy hair and the dimple in his chin. They’d known each other since elementary school; she’d watched him grow from a skinny boy into a thickset young man. Sylvie inventoried what was inside her: She’d wanted this boy in her arms once upon a time, but she was no longer sure she did. She wasn’t the girl she used to be; that girl had a father and a mother and dreams for her future. Now Sylvie was a librarian struggling to make her own home. Her fantasies had gone on hold when her father died, the third doors had sealed shut, and the only man she thought about was the one married to her sister.
Sylvie shook her head, trying to clear away those thoughts, and said, “Are you going to kiss me or what?”
Ernie’s smile deepened and they each took a step forward, till their bodies met. Her hands on the back of his neck, his arms around her waist. Sylvie felt her body issue a silent moan of relief. It felt nice, like it used to. Thank goodness. She wondered over the synchronicity of Ernie showing up now, when her apartment key was sitting in her hip pocket, when she needed to be distracted. Maybe this was a chance for Sylvie to start over. Maybe this version of her would date Ernie, like her sisters had wanted her to.
When they stepped apart and glanced around for patrons or Head Librarian Elaine, Sylvie said, “Did you know that I got my own apartment?”
He shook his head. “No way. That’s amazing.”
It was amazing that she had her own place. Most of the kids they’d gone to school with either still lived with their parents or had, like Julia, moved directly from their father’s house into their married home. Sylvie appreciated that she was unusual. Cecelia was even more unusual, of course, with her fatherless baby and apartment with Emeline. Julia was the only one toeing the traditional line. Looking at Ernie, with the key in her pocket, Sylvie felt hopeful. She was back in her own life, on her own terms.
She said, “Would you like to see it? My apartment?”
Ernie tilted his head to the side, then said, “Sure.”
They made a plan, and when he left the library, she walked to the empty desk in the back corner and picked up the phone. She knew William might be home at this hour, so she dialed her other sisters.
Emeline answered the phone. “Padavano sisters’ residence.”
Sylvie laughed. “Why are you answering the phone like that?”
“For some reason it amuses Izzy. Are you at the library?”
“I just needed to tell someone that Ernie came back. Today. He found me in the stacks.”
“Oh, thank goodness!” All the sisters knew that Sylvie’s boys had evaporated when Charlie died. They’d discussed, numerous times, why this might be the case. “Did he say why he’d stayed away?”
“Emmie, I invited him to my apartment tonight.”
There was a silence. Then Emeline said, “Wo-o-o-o-w.”
Sylvie could hear her sister smiling and Izzy burbling somewhere near the phone line.
“I’m going to be the only one of us who’s still a virgin,” Emeline said. “You have to call me after and tell me everything.”
“Do you want me to ask him if he has a nice friend to set you up with?”
“Heavens, no.” Emeline said this cheerfully. “I’m too busy with classes and work. But this is so exciting, Syl! Don’t forget to shave your legs. Look at your body and try to see it like a stranger.”
“He’s not a stranger. I’ve known him my whole life.”
“You know what I mean.”
Sylvie looked down at her jeans and tennis shoes. She tried to remember which pair of underwear she had put on that morning.
Emeline said, “You told Julia he came by, right?” When Sylvie didn’t respond right away, she said, “You have to call her, Sylvie. She’ll be hurt if you don’t tell her.”
Sylvie sighed. By the complicated math that tied the sisters together, Emeline was correct. There were four of them, but inside the four there were two pairs: Sylvie and Julia, and Emeline and Cecelia.
“You’re in your own place now,” Emeline said. She meant: It was excusable for you to be weird with Julia while you were homeless and sleeping next to me at night, but now you’re settled, so you need to do better.
“God damn it, Emeline,” Sylvie said. She knew Emeline didn’t like it when she swore. “Why do you have to be so wise?”
“I’m the only one without my own personal life, so I have time to watch you all.”
“I have to go back to work,” Sylvie said, and hung up. She told herself to call Julia whenever there was a lull at the library, but she didn’t, and the next thing she knew, it was time to close up.
* * *
—
Ernie arrived at eight on the dot, and Sylvie suspected he had been walking around the block until the exact time arrived. He wasn’t wearing his usual uniform of a white T-shirt and dark pants with pockets designed to hold tools. He had on a button-down shirt, and his hair was combed. He held a bottle of red wine.
“Do you like wine?” he asked.
Sylvie nodded, though she wondered if she would be able to drink. She was so nervous she was finding it hard to swallow. She looked around her tiny apartment and tried to see it through his eyes. Did it look worn and sad in the lamplight?
Ernie touched her cheek and said, “I can go if you want. We don’t need to do this, whatever this is.”
“Yes, we do,” she said. This was her new life, her life, whether she was ready for it or not. “Kiss me. That will make me feel better.”