We both went downstairs to join him, Daddy, and Mother. He had come for lunch but had also brought a portfolio of new fashion ideas for teenage girls and wanted our opinions. The three of them were in the living room, and Uncle Perry had his portfolio opened on the large glass coffee table. Mother was looking down at it, and Daddy was sitting in his favorite easy chair, puffing on his meerschaum pipe, which had been his father’s.
Uncle Perry was wearing a bright blue blazer and light blue slacks with blue boat shoes. He wore a cravat and looked as if he had just stepped off the cover of a fashion magazine himself. The moment we entered, he brightened, but I felt he was looking mainly at me.
“Ah, the infamous Heavenstone sisters,” he declared. Mother laughed. “Just in time, girls. I’d love for you to peruse my new creations. Your father has yet to groan or moan, which usually means I’m right on track or, as he would say, still in the black.”
“Lucky is all you are,” Daddy said.
“What difference does it make if the bottom line is where you want it, Teddy?”
Now Daddy grunted.
We both looked at the portfolio. Uncle Perry stepped back, and Cassie began to turn the pages. I thought everything looked terrific and couldn’t wait for some of it.
“They look sloppy to me,” Cassie said coldly.
“Sloppy is in, Cassie. You should know that better than I,” Uncle Perry said, turning his attention to me. “Besides, it’s not really sloppy. It looks like it’s sloppy, but everything is coordinated, all the layered clothing, the shoes, the hats.”
I nodded. “The girls in my class would love it all,” I said. He beamed.
“She’s right. The girls in her class would,” Cassie said.
“Well, they are the ones with the discretionary income, according to our marketing analysis, Cassie,” Uncle Perry said softly.
“I wouldn’t buy them.”
Uncle Perry held his smile, but I could see the pain in his eyes.
Cassie looked at Daddy and added, “But I don’t follow the flock, so I’m not really a good judge when it comes to what will and won’t sell. I’m sure all this will do fine.”
“Thank you, Cassie. That’s almost a compliment,” Uncle Perry said, and Mother laughed.
Cassie was not one to blush or redden, but she did this time. It made my heart thump. Would she say something nasty? Uncle Perry turned back to me.
“In two months, you can start wearing some of this, Sam.”
Sam was the nickname Uncle Perry had given me from the very first day he learned my name was Semantha. Mother thought it was cute. Daddy never told him not to call me that. In fact, I sometimes felt he wished he had come up with it first. Cassie hated it. Now that she had exposed Uncle Perry’s sexual preferences, she would whisper later on, “He likes to turn everything into his way of seeing the world. Sam is more of a man’s name. Get it?”
I shook my head.
“You will,” she promised, and left it at that.
Later, at lunch, Uncle Perry talked about his upcoming vacation. He was going on a Caribbean cruise. He loved traveling and had gone to far more places than Daddy and Mother. Mother had many questions about his trip, but Daddy seemed reluctant to ask or hear any answers.
Cassie leaned over to whisper, “It’s probably a gay men’s cruise.”
I nearly choked on my salmon.
“So,” Uncle Perry said after Mother and Cassie had brought out coffee and some Danish for dessert, “how do you girls feel about having a new little brother?”
“How should we feel?” Cassie replied. The way she looked at him made it seem she really wanted to hear his answer. I could see it threw him off. He looked at Daddy and then smiled.
“I would imagine excited,” he said.
“Well, of course,” Cassie said. “And we’re happy for our parents, too.”
Uncle Perry nodded. He drank his coffee, glanced at me, and looked now as if he couldn’t wait to be on his way. After lunch, however, Daddy took him to his office to discuss some business. Later, after we helped Mother clean up, Cassie told me to follow her up to her bedroom. Even though she closed the door behind us and we were far from anyone who could hear us, she still whispered.
“Now you should have no trouble understanding why Daddy wanted Mother to get pregnant so much.”