My Sister's Keeper Read online

  "Do you think Anna's doing okay?" Julia asks.

  "I don't think she would have filed a lawsuit if she was." I hesitate. "Sara says she wants attention."

  "What do you think?"

  To buy time, I take a forkful of eggs. The horseradish turned out to be surprisingly good. It brings out the orange. I tell Julia Romano this.

  She folds her napkin next to her own plate. "You didn't answer my question, Mr. Fitzgerald."

  "I don't think it's that simple." I very carefully set my silverware down. "Do you have brothers or sisters?"

  "Both. Six older brothers and a twin sister."

  I whistle. "Your parents must have a hell of a lot of patience."

  She shrugs. "Good Catholics. I don't know how they did it, either, but none of us fell through the cracks."

  "Did you always think so?" I ask. "Did you ever feel, when you were a kid, that maybe they were playing favorites?" Her face tightens, just the tiniest bit, and I feel bad about putting her on the spot. "We all know you're supposed to love your kids equal, but that's not always how it works out." I get to my feet. "You got a little extra time? There's someone I'd like you to meet."

  *

  Last winter we got an ambulance call in the dead of winter for a guy who lived up a rural road. The contractor he hired to plow his driveway had found him and called 911; apparently the guy had gotten out of his car the night before, slipped, and froze right to the gravel; the contractor nearly ran over him, thinking he was a drift.

  When we got to the scene, he'd been outside for nearly eight hours, and he was nothing more than an ice cube with no pulse. His knees were bent; I remember this, because when we finally pried him out and set him on a backboard, there they were, sticking straight up in the air. We got the heat cranked in the ambulance and brought him inside, starting to cut off his clothes. By the time we had our paperwork in order for the hospital transport, the guy was sitting up and talking to us.

  I tell you this to show you that in spite of what you'd think, miracles happen.

  *

  It's a cliche, but the reason I became a firefighter in the first place was because I wanted to save people. So the moment I emerged from the fiery arched doorway with Luisa in my arms, when her mother first saw us and fell to her knees, I knew I had done my job and done it well. She swooped down beside the EMT from the second crew who got a line into the girl's arm and put her on oxygen. The kid was coughing, frightened, but she would be fine.

  The fire was all but out; the boys were inside doing salvage and overhaul. Smoke drew a veil over the night sky; I couldn't make out a single star in the constellation Scorpio. I took off my gloves and wiped my hands across my eyes, which would sting for hours. "Good work," I said to Red, as he packed up the hose.

  "Good save, Cap," he called back.

  It would have been better, of course, if Luisa had been in her own room, as her mother expected. But kids don't stay where they're supposed to. You turn around and find her not in the bedroom but hiding in a closet; you turn around and see she's not three but thirteen. Parenting is really just a matter of tracking, of hoping your kids do not get so far ahead you can no longer see their next moves.

  I took off my helmet and stretched the muscles of my neck. I looked up at the structure that was once a home. Suddenly I felt fingers wrap around my hand. The woman who lived here stood with tears in her eyes. Her youngest was still in her arms; the other kids were sitting in the fire truck under Red's supervision. Silently she raised my knuckles to her lips. A streak of soot came off my jacket to stripe her cheek. "You're welcome," I said.

  On our way back to the station I directed Caesar the long way, so that we passed right down the street where I live. Jesse's Jeep sat in my driveway; the lights in the house were all off. I pictured Anna with the covers pulled up to her chin, like usual; Kate's bed empty.

  "We all set, Fitz?" Caesar asked. The truck was barely crawling, almost stopped directly in front of my driveway.

  "Yeah, we're set," I said. "Let's take it on home."

  I became a firefighter because I wanted to save people. But I should have been more specific. I should have named names.

  JULIA

  BRIAN FITZGERALD'S CAR IS FILLED with stars. There are charts on the passenger seat and tables jammed into the console between us; the backseat is a palette for Xerox copies of nebulae and planets. "Sorry," he says, reddening. "I wasn't expecting company."

  I help him clear off a space for me, and in the process pick up a map made of pinpricks. "What's this?" I ask.

  "A sky atlas." He shrugs. "It's kind of a hobby."

  "When I was little, I once tried to name every star in the sky after one of my relatives. The scary part is I hadn't run out of names by the time I fell asleep."

  "Anna's named after a galaxy," Brian says.

  "That's much cooler than being named after a patron saint," I muse. "Once, I asked my mom why stars shine. She said they were night-lights, so the angels could find their way around in Heaven. But when I asked my dad, he started talking about gas, and somehow I put it all together and figured that the food God served caused multiple trips to the bathroom in the middle of the night."

  Brian laughs out loud. "And here I was trying to explain atomic fusion to my kids."

  "Did it work?"

  He considers for a moment. "They could all probably find the Big Dipper with their eyes closed."

  "That's impressive. Stars all look the same to me."

  "It's not that hard. You spot a piece of a constellation--like Orion's belt--and suddenly it's easier to find Rigel in his foot and Betelgeuse in his shoulder." He hesitates. "But ninety percent of the universe is made of stuff we can't even see."

  "Then how do you know it's there?"

  He slows to a stop at a red light. "Dark matter has a gravitational effect on other objects. You can't see it, you can't feel it, but you can watch something being pulled in its direction."

  *

  Ten seconds after Campbell left last night, Izzy walked into the living room where I was just on the cusp of having one of those bone-cleansing cries a woman should treat herself to at least once during a lunar cycle. "Yeah," she said dryly. "I can see this is a totally professional relationship."

  I scowled at her. "Were you eavesdropping?"

  "Pardon me if you and Romeo were having your little tete-a-tete through a thin wall."

  "If you've got something to say," I suggested, "say it."

  "Me?" Izzy frowned. "Hey, it's none of my business, is it?"

  "No, it's not."

  "Right. So I'll just keep my opinion to myself."

  I rolled my eyes. "Out with it, Isobel."

  "Thought you'd never ask." She sat down beside me on the couch. "You know, Julia, the first time a bug sees that big purple zapper light, it looks like God. The second time, he runs in the other direction."

  "First, don't compare me to a mosquito. Second, he'd fly in the other direction, not run. Third, there is no second time. The bug's dead."

  Izzy smirked. "You are such a lawyer."

  "I am not letting Campbell zap me."

  "Then request a transfer."

  "This isn't the Navy." I hugged one of the throw pillows from the couch. "And I can't do that, not now. It'll make him think that I'm such a wimp I can't balance my professional life with some stupid, silly, adolescent . . . incident."

  "You can't." Izzy shook her head. "He's an egotistical dickhead who's going to chew you up and spit you out; and you have a really awful history of falling for assholes that you ought to run screaming from; and I don't feel like sitting around listening to you try to convince yourself you don't still feel something for Campbell Alexander when, in fact, you've spent the past fifteen years trying to fill in the hole he made inside you."

  I stared at her. "Wow."

  She shrugged. "Guess I had a lot to get off my chest, after all."

  "Do you hate all men, or just Campbell?"

  Izzy seemed to think