I almost feel bad about throwing my arms around her in front of Stan, considering all he’s maybe had to deal with. But I do anyway, I hug her close, and I smile, and I feel her hug me back a bit too. Which is not her usual thing, but man, it is nice right now.
I put my arm around her shoulder and say, “How are things, kid sister?” She sort of looks ahead, and her face doesn’t look too sad, or too hurt, and I smile at her, and we make tracks to the door, which will lead us to the parking lot, wherein is parked the car, which will take us home.
I look over at Stan, who has to wait around for Ted a while longer. He waves, like It’s fine to go, don’t wait up for me, is how I choose to interpret that. As we’re heading to the door, I hear Jane say, “Ted’ll be with you in a moment, Stan. We gave him a little something to cool him down a bit, nothing to worry about.” I look back at Stan one last time before we push through the doors, and from the look on his face, this is not the first time that a conversation with Jane about Ted has ended this way.
Only about a mile into our journey, it starts to rain.
“It’s raining,” I tell Callie. I glance at her and watch my words wash over her like the rain does over us, here, now, in the car, just gliding off and sliding to the floor in a puddle to be stepped in.
FOUR
IT’S BEEN A few days since the hospital, and Callie’s calmed down a bit. Mom and Dad are acting a little off, walking around the house as if trying not to wake a sleeping monster, whispering furtively. Why they would whisper instead of text, I have no idea. I ask Callie if she thinks that Mom and Dad whispering instead of texting has something to do with them being old, and a general reluctance to change or grow or adapt. Callie smiles at me and puts an entire Ritz cracker in her mouth.
“What was that, honey?” asks Mom from the other room, thinking I was talking to her.
“Oh, nothing. I was just talking to Callie. Just remarking on progress and its wants,” I tell her.
“Well, look at you,” she says, entering the kitchen.
“We have something to tell you, sport,” says Dad, coming down the stairs behind her.
“But first,” says Mom, “do you have your fake ID on you?”
ABOUT FORTY OR fifty minutes later we’re sitting at their favorite restaurant, this Italian place, which is great since I gave up being a vegetarian around the time I realized that idealism wouldn’t save me from my own feelings, and their chicken parm is amazing. I’m looking over the menu like I have any idea about wine, or like there’s any chance I’m going to order anything other than chicken parm. We’re in the back, behind a wall that separates us from the rest of the restaurant, with Callie vaguely boxed in, like we usually sit at family gatherings. Callie’s going to have the salad, I know, and is right now really into eating all of those breadsticks that are basically sticks.
Me, I’m trying really hard to be nonchalant about Mom’s nonchalance about my fake ID. Was she just assuming I have one because she knows all of her college students have had one since freshman year? Or did she actually find mine in the laundry or something? I’m starting to worry that all of this is just a trap and a prelude to a big punishment, and then they start in with it, using their sincerest voices. Their change in tone causes Callie to look over at me, smile, and then put an entire dinner roll in her mouth.
“Kid sister,” I say to her conspiratorially, “did you just make a joke? ’Cuz of what you did earlier, with the cracker?” Callie stares straight ahead, keeps mum. “And did I just ruin the joke by explaining it?” Probably I did, and I could swear she’s nodding at me. “I did,” I say, and then the parents begin to speak.
“Honey, we are just so proud of you for the other night.”
“Just the proudest, sport.”
“Really.”
“The way you took care of your sister shows true strength of character. Port in a storm, good in a crisis.”
Callie starts nodding again, assuming she even stopped in the first place, after I ruined her joke. Mom and Dad are looking at me and smiling, and so is she. Or that’s why she’s smiling, because Mom and Dad are. I can look at it however I want, right? Because I’m special and important and reliable and basically the world’s best big sister.
“Tom, what are you getting?” Mom shifts topics when the server arrives to take our orders. The server smiles at us, but especially at Callie. Everyone here loves Callie. She’s cute, she smiles, she’s quiet, and she has never had a fit here. When we were littler, I used to think we should just live here and then she’d be fine forever.