I picked her up so she wouldn’t get trampled. She wore an elephant suit, soft and plush, and her brown eyes blinked up at me. I stroked her tiny head, her hair still soft and fine but already that familiar Barbanel brown. “Hello, Steffie. You can’t keep up with the big kids; you’re too little.”
Thankfully, her normal impulse to burst into tears at anygiven moment was overridden by surprise at seeing me. She stuck her thumb in her mouth and sucked.
“Hey, Shira.” Noah walked in, followed by Abby, his girlfriend. He looked half-pleased and half-disinterested by the sight of me—his standard reaction, which was annoying given how all I really wanted was to hang out with him. But affection dwarfed my irritation. He’d left for college in August, and save visits at the High Holidays and Thanksgiving, I hadn’t seen him in months—a lonely switch, since I used to see him almost every day.
I shifted the baby to my hip and one-arm hugged him. “How was the ceremony?”
“It was fine.”
Abby nudged him. “It was a very big deal,” she corrected. “There hasn’t been a freshman who won in a decade.”
“It was mostly because of my advisor,” he said. “I just helped out.”
Noah had spent his first semester of freshman year interning with a professor at the Arnold Arboretum in Boston, and had received a special award for his contributions. This was just like Noah, to not only know exactly what he wanted to do, but to also win awards for it. “I wish I’d been there.” I glanced at Abby. “Did you go?”
“Barely made it,” she said. Abby was a senior in high school, a year older than me. “My dad drove me into the city after my last final.”
Weird how Massachusetts people calledBoston“the city,” but okay. “Cool.”
The wave of relatives pushed them on, up the stairs with their bags in hand. Abby would share my room, but I wondered how much I’d see her. I didn’t know her well, but she seemed fine so far. Nosy, but she made Noah happy.
They were followed by Aunt Liz, who removed her offspring from my arms with an “Oh, good, you found her,” and then by Grandma and Grandpa. Grandpa tolerated a hug from me; he was ninety—impossibly old—but still moving. Grandma wasn’t much younger but still seemed spry and spoke crisply. “How are you, dear? Survived the night in this drafty old house?”
“She wasfine, Helen,” Grandpa said. “She’s not a child.”
Grandma rolled her eyes (which she swore she’d picked up from me) and swept on, while Grandpa turned in the opposite direction. I watched them, unease curling in my stomach.
When Noah and I were little and my grandparents lived in Manhattan, we used to see them all the time. But a few years ago, they moved to Nantucket full-time, so I saw their interactions less. Their marriage had never been filled with PDA, which I’d always assumed was because they were old and prudish. But lately...
My parents appeared. Mom pulled me into a tight hug before setting me back and studying me, as though expecting to find a broken limb or other injury. “Are you okay?”
“It was only one night.” Sometimes I wished my parents had had more kids, so they could spread the worry around.
Dad gave me a brief hug before returning to his conversation with my uncle Harry, Noah’s father. Dad always had Very Important things to discuss with his siblings and parents, which apparently was what happened when you were an executive in a Very Important firm. Mom swept my hair out of my face. “How did your midterms go?”
“They went.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Shira—”
“Mom.”
She sighed. “You said you were fine with Dad and me going to Boston.”
I shrugged.
“Are you upset we missed the first night of Hanukkah?”
I unbent, since she looked so concerned. “You couldn’t help it.”
She hugged me. “Honey, I’m sorry. You know we would’ve rather been here with you.”
“I know. Anyway, the tests were fine. I just missed you.”
“Well, by the end of the holidays you’ll be sick of us,” she teased.
Unlikely. I never got sick of my family.
“Shira!”
