seem fair to have your sister leave home when you were only nine. They were going to pick her up at school to go with them to the museum, and Ginny had been looking forward to having her to herself in the backseat. Plus, for some reason, Cassie hated Sid, and she’d be mad he was coming.
Ron pulled into Lily House’s driveway, and Eleanor got out. Ginny couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen Sid. She took in his bell-bottom corduroys and jean jacket, the dark hair that reached jaggedly for his shoulders, and the cigarette clamped in his mouth and decided he looked like a musician on the cover of a record album, lanky and loose. He appeared to be fiddling with the windshield wiper on Fran’s car.
Sid looked up at them, plucked the cigarette from his mouth and ground it into the dirt with his boot. He didn’t move toward them when Eleanor got out of the car.
“Oh, boy,” Ron said.
Sid and her mother exchanged a few words, and Sid disappeared into the house. Eleanor marched back to the car. “Fran will come up with some reason he can’t go with us, of course. Even on my birthday.”
Ginny hoped she was right. Ron started the engine, and Eleanor said, “Turn it off. We’ll just wait. I haven’t seen him in three years, for God’s sake. She’s just jealous! She’s been jealous since the day I was born!”
Lily House’s door opened. Sid stood on the porch with his knapsack for a few moments, as if still deciding.
Eleanor said, “Oh!” and her face lit up the way it did when she’d see a Jack-in-the-Pulpit in the woods. She got out of the car and climbed into the backseat with Ginny.
“Why does he get the front?” Ginny asked.
“Because he has long legs.”
Sid’s knapsack landed on the floor in the front seat. “Thanks for the rescue, gang,” he said when he got in. “Nice Pontiac, Ron.” The car filled with a smoky smell.
“Sid’s coming to the museum with us!” Eleanor announced gaily. “Then we’re going to drop him at the bus station to go back to Chapin. Ginny, say hello.”
“Hello,” Ginny said.
“So how’s school, dear?” Eleanor asked Sid. “Are you still painting?”
“Still painting. Senior year. A lot of work. Not much sleep. On top of it, I was up half the night with Fran, so if you don’t mind, I’m going to take a little snooze.”
Sid slumped against the car door. Eleanor looked out the window. Ginny stewed; her mother would never have allowed Cassie to get away with such rudeness.
No one said a word. Halfway between home and Boston, they stopped to pick up Cassie at Andrews Academy, the all-girls boarding school that Eleanor’s “summer person” friends had recommended when Eleanor complained that her older daughter had gone boy crazy and her teachers didn’t challenge her. Andrews had given Cassie a scholarship, and her wealthy godmother had provided the balance of the tuition. To Ginny’s astonishment, Cassie had been fine with going away to school and didn’t even tear up when they dropped her off in September. Ginny had cried hard that night, in bed.
When the station wagon pulled up in front of the dormitory, two girls wearing carpenter’s overalls walked by, and Ron chuckled, “Would you look at the outfits?” Cassie bounced down the steps smiling, her long blonde hair shimmering against her navy loden coat. She hadn’t gone for the “hippie” look yet, Ginny noted with some relief.
When Cassie spotted the sleeping Sid, her mouth dropped open.
“Oof,” she said, sliding onto the seat next to Ginny. “What’s Sid doing here?”
“He’s coming to the museum with us!” Eleanor said. She put her finger to her lips to keep Cassie from saying more.
Cassie pinched Ginny’s arm lightly, signaling her annoyance. “Happy birthday, Mom,” she said. “Pretty jacket, Gin.”
Ginny looked down at the red-and-purple plaid that had caught her mother’s eye in the bin at Filene’s Basement on their semiannual shopping trip. Now, she floated in Cassie’s sweet smell—Prell, she knew; their mother had taught them to wash their hair with soap, but Cassie had graduated to shampoo.
Eleanor opened the cooler and passed the girls the cucumber sandwiches she’d made.
“Our chorus sang at chapel this morning,” Cassie said.
“Oh, how nice, dear. Something classical? Hymns?”
“We sang ‘Blowin’ in the Wind.’ It’s a Peter, Paul, and Mary song.”
Eleanor clucked her tongue and shook her head, dispersing her disapproval over the backseat.
Cassie said, “It smells like pot in here.”
Sid woke up as they were parking the car in the museum lot. “Whoa, where’d we get Cassie from?” he said, twisting to peer at them.
“I’m their firstborn, remember?” Cassie said. Eleanor shot Cassie a frown.
“So,” Sid said, grinning at Cassie. “You going to that Woodstock concert next weekend? Going to be good.”
Eleanor’s head cranked hard to look at Cassie. “I’m only kidding, Ellie,” Sid said. “She’s way too young for that.”
Cassie got out of the car and motored toward the museum entrance. Ginny trailed behind, wondering why Sid rankled her older sister so and feeling fairly certain that one of them was going to ruin the birthday.
But something came over her mother, Ginny noticed, whenever she stepped inside a museum or concert hall; here, at the Museum of Fine Arts, her mood and even her height seemed to elevate in proportion to the majestic domed lobby.
And now, Sid cocked his head and said to Eleanor, “Your coat, Madame?”
“Well, certainly sir,” Eleanor beamed as Sid lifted her coat from her shoulders.
Cassie looked at Ginny and frowned. As the family followed the crowd toward the grand staircase, an older woman with a large emerald dragonfly pinned to her blazer lapel bent down to say to Eleanor, “Your daughters are just lovely!”
“Well, aren’t you nice to say so,” her mother said. She looked her girls over proudly, and Ginny stood up straighter. “And this is my nephew,” she said, turning with a sweep of her arm, only to realize Sid had drifted away.
Experienced museumgoers, the Gilberts spent a respectable amount of time on each painting, careful not to block the views of others. Today, Ginny had a hard time concentrating on the art because she was busy monitoring Cassie and Sid, who seemed to be steering clear of each other and the rest of them. At least Ginny’s father—balding but handsome, she thought, in his tweed sport coat—had placed his hand protectively at the center of her mother’s back and for once, Eleanor didn’t pull away.
Now, her father lowered his head to catch her mother’s murmured remarks to Ginny.
“Isn’t it interesting how quiet his colors are compared to the others? Just exquisite!” Ginny and her father leaned their faces closer to Eleanor’s;
