The Language of Sisters Read Free

walls white. The bedroom has windows on both walls, and another set of French doors leads to a second deck.
    A ladder in the office leads to the wheelhouse up top where Captain Petey used to steer the tugboat up and down the river. The wood captain’s wheel and an old, gray clunky phone with a silver bell on top of it are still there, as is the dark wood paneling on the lower half. There is also an array, on a panel in front of the captain’s wheel, of radios, levers, switches, gauges, and controls to drive the tugboat.
    The top half, into the ceiling, is all windows so Petey could see in all directions. The roof windows make it excellent for stargazing.
    I had a three-foot-wide bench built up in the wheelhouse, raised over four feet. I added a long red mattress and a pile of red and white pillows with fabric from India, Thailand, Norway, Pakistan, Mexico, China, and Hawaii.
    I can sit on the bench in the wheelhouse and have an incredible view of downtown Portland if I look one way and the ruffles of the river and towering trees if I look the other way. Sometimes I go up there to cry.
    Outside I have another “house,” built on my side deck. It’s not a real house. More like a shelter with a door. I don’t go in there. It hurts me too much. When I moved in, I shoved in what needed to be there, then shut and locked the door.
    Locked. It’s locked.
    I can’t see unlocking it anytime soon.
    * * *
    An hour later I called my father from my deck, Mr. and Mrs. Quackenbusch in the water by my feet. “Mama’s upset about Ellie.”
    â€œI know, I know,” he said, his voice sad, moaning. My father is tall, balding, with a chest like a bull, a broken nose shifted a bit to the side from his boxing years in Moscow, and brown eyes that have seen way, way too much. In Moscow he was a physics professor at the university before he was arrested and entered prison/hell, his scars our reminder.
    I could hear the restaurant sounds in the background—plates clanging, waitresses chatting, a chef yelling, lively Russian music. “My poor Svetlana. She worry. I okay he a Italian, you know what I saying, Antonia? But I no think those two, not a up match.... ”
    I knew he meant “Not a matchup.” My father’s English gets worse as he gets upset, too. I listened as he told me what he thought of Gino, Elvira’s fiancé. “He handsome. He funny. He love Elvira, I knows, I see it. But Elvira ... she not, what you call it? She not over the sun for him.”
    â€œOver the moon.”
    â€œShe not over sun or moon. I worry. I don’t like that Gino’s hair. Vain. Why a man care about his hair? Not me. I no care. He not enough for my Elvira. What his real job? Huh? You tell me, what his real job?”
    â€œEntrepreneur.”
    â€œEntrepreneur.” He slung that word out long and slow. “That mean he want to be leech off my Elvira’s pillow business.”
    â€œI don’t think so. He does own parts of a number of businesses.” Gino did well. So did Ellie with her pillow-making business.
    â€œWhat your mama making?”
    â€œShe had chicken, walnuts, coriander, flour, and white wine out. She said she’s drinking wine for inspiration. I don’t know what she’s cooking. She’s experimenting, throwing things in, chopping like a fiend. If she likes it, she says she’ll make it at the restaurant tonight. She says it’s called ‘My Childrens Makes Me Worry.’ ”
    My mother liked it. She brought her recipe down. First diners sampled it.
    Word travelled fast. It was a ninety-minute wait into our restaurant that night.
    * * *
    Two nights later, he called.
    â€œI’m having the flashbacks, Toni. And the nightmares.”
    â€œThey’re back again?” I slung my feet over my lower deck, then rubbed my forehead, right by my widow’s peak. It was nine o’clock at night, stars blocked out by clouds.