As Florence went to put the money back in their cash box, Vivian could see that it wouldn’t have been enough. She shivered, her hands clenching into tight fists before a sharp burst of pain made her remember her injury and relax them again. She didn’t want to think about her night in jail, didn’t want to think what would have happened if Florence had searched all over the city to bail her out, only to come up still short.
Instead, she took refuge in the carelessness that she knew would push her sister away again. “Yeah, that wouldn’t have been any fun,” she said, letting her borrowed coat fall to the floor in an untidy pile. Kicking off her heels and leaving them by the door, she tossed her purse on the table and shrugged. “Sorry to make you fuss.”
Florence had stiffened, and her jaw clenched as she turned around to face Vivian again. “Me too. Were you?”
“Was I what?”
“In jail,” Florence said quietly. “Or were you with a man?”
Vivian made the mistake of meeting her sister’s eyes. She was tired, and her hand ached, and it was too hard to pretend to be thoughtless when Florence was staring at her like that. “Jail,” she admitted, her voice barely above a whisper.
She waited for the storm of anger, but Florence just shook her head. “And I suppose some man got you out.”
“No.” At her sister’s skeptical look, Vivian grew indignant. “I’m telling the truth. Bea spent all night scrounging up bail money for me.”
“Well, thank God for Bea, then.” Florence shook her head. “The things we owe that family.”
“I know.” It was one of the few things they always agreed on.
Vivian waited for her sister to ask why Bea hadn’t come to her for help if she needed cash for Vivian’s bail. But Florence just sighed again. “What happened to your hand?”
Vivian glanced down. The bandage had gotten dirty, and it was starting to come untied. “Got cut. I should probably clean it up.”
“I’ll do it. Sit down,” Florence said.
Vivian didn’t argue. As she sat, she unwrapped the cloth with her good hand while Florence retrieved a basket of fresh bandages from their place in a kitchen cabinet, along with an unmarked amber bottle. There was still water in the kettle from the day before; she poured that into a bowl, then grabbed a fresh towel. Bringing them to the table, she pulled Vivian’s hand toward her and examined the ugly cut, her forehead creasing in worry. Then she sighed, spread the towel underneath, and picked up the amber bottle.
“Keep still.” Florence held her sister’s hand in a surprisingly strong grip as she poured a thin stream of liquid over the cut.
Vivian yelped in surprise and pain. “Goddamn,that hurts.”
“Vivian!” Florence’s voice was sharp, but her hands were gentle as she sponged clean water over the cut to rinse away the clots of blood that had loosened. “You know better than to take the Lord’s name in vain.”
“Not when something stings that bad, I don’t,” Vivian countered, gritting her teeth. “What the hell was it?”
Florence’s mouth tightened. For a moment Vivian thought she was still annoyed by the cursing. Then she realized Florence was blushing. “Some of Mr. Brown’s homebrew. I bought a bottle last month for emergencies.”
“You keep a stash of moonshine in our kitchen? How did I not know that?”
“It’s a bottle of antiseptic,” Florence countered. “Drinking it would be like drinking gasoline.”
Vivian tried to pull her hand away as Florence pulled out a clean bandage. “I can do that.”
“Not with one hand you can’t,” her sister said, a note of exasperation in her voice. “Please, just hold still, will you?”
Vivian relented, sighing as she watched. “You don’t have to act like my mother, you know.”
Florence’s hands stilled for a moment before she continued wrapping the bandage. “Well, I don’t have much chance of mothering anyone else. You should be used to it by now.”
An uncomfortable weight settled in Vivian’s chest at her sister’s words. “Flo,” she said hesitantly. “Do you want to have children?”
Florence finished tucking in the ends of the bandage. “Don’t you?”
“Never really thought about it,” Vivian admitted. “No one around here makes it look like much fun.”
“Well, I do.” Florence stood abruptly, shoving the bottle of moonshine and the bandages back into her basket and gathering the bloody ones to toss into the laundry pail. “But I’m twenty-six years old and stuck here. So it looks like you’re as close as I’m going to get, unless I want to end up like Mrs. Thomas.”
“You might still meet a fella,” said Vivian awkwardly, unsure how to respond. When the nuns set them up with jobs and sent them out into the world to scrounge for themselves, Florence had always seemed to accept that was all they could expect out of life. As much as Vivian knew she wanted more for herself, it had never occurred to her to wonder if her quiet, uncomplaining sister felt the same. “You could always come out dancing with me.”
