“Have you been practicing?”
“Yes, and I’m awesome.”
“Then we’ll play. Tonight you sleep.”
Claire kissed Søren on the cheek and grabbed Eleanor by the arm.
“Let’s go,” Claire said, dragging Eleanor up the steps. “We can talk about him behind his back, and then he’ll regret introducing us.”
“I already do,” Søren said from behind them.
Eleanor followed Claire to the red room and found that the girl had damn good taste. Giant four-poster bed, huge couches, portrait art on the walls—it looked like a room from an English estate rather than an American mansion.
“Nice.” Eleanor nodded her approval.
“It’s okay. Old-fashioned. Are you in love with my brother?”
Eleanor dropped her bag on the floor.
“Can you tell me the right answer to that question before I answer it?”
Claire grinned ear to ear. With that big smile she came darn close to being as striking as her older brother.
“If I wasn’t his sister I’d be in love with him. I am in love with him, but not that way.”
“He’s worried about you.” Eleanor hoped a careful change of subject would work. “He wants to know why you stopped writing him letters.”
Claire groaned and threw herself onto the bed. She buried her face against a pillow and laughed.
This seemed like entirely inappropriate behavior for a girl whose father died that week. Eleanor decided to roll with it.
Claire flipped onto her back and smiled up at the ceiling. Eleanor dug through her duffel bag for the boxer shorts and Pearl Jam T-shirt she’d packed as pajamas.
“It’s very weird having a brother for a priest.”
“You mean, a priest for a brother?”
“Right.” Claire nodded.
“I don’t have any brothers or sisters, so having a brother would be weird enough to start with. But the priest thing, yeah, that’s gotta be weird.”
“It’s beyond weird. Plus he’s thirty and I’m sixteen so he should be the one out there doing stuff, dating, getting married, whatever, and I should be the innocent virginal one, right? Instead he hasn’t dated anybody since he was a teenager and I’m …”
“You have a boyfriend.” Eleanor stripped out of her shirt and unhooked her bra.
“I do.”
“And you two are …”
“Yeah.” Claire winced.
Eleanor glared at her.
“You lucky bitch.”
Claire laughed again and pulled the covers down on the bed. They spent the next two hours talking about Claire’s boyfriend, Ike, and their sex life, which didn’t amount to much more than a dozen encounters in his bedroom or the basement after school while his parents were still at work. Claire had decided sex was the greatest thing ever and Ike agreed with her. They’d do it more often but he came from conservative Jewish parents who didn’t like him dating a Gentile and would have been furious to find out they were having sex.
“I’d sell my soul to get laid,” Eleanor sighed.
“You’re gorgeous, Elle. You can get any guy you want. Why are you still a virgin?”
“Ask your brother that question.”
“Oh, just do what I did with Ike.”
“What is that?”
Claire grinned devilishly.
“Jump him.”
By midnight Eleanor had extracted a promise from Claire that she’d tell Søren she had a boyfriend and that was why she’d been too busy to write lately. Mission accomplished, Eleanor fell asleep without giving a second thought to the fact that she slept in a bed in the house Søren had grown up in and that in bed with her was his baby sister. She was in love with a Catholic priest who acted liked he owned her. Weird was her new normal.
Eleanor woke up the next morning and she and Claire had breakfast in their pajamas. She couldn’t believe Søren hated this place so much. She’d never been in a big old mansion like this before. This sort of country living suited her fine.
After breakfast she hid out in the bedroom while Claire went downstairs with Søren. The wake would last all day and the funeral and burial would take place tomorrow morning. She’d packed books and homework to occupy her while all the family stuff happened.
“Let no one in the door,” Søren ordered, “except for—”
“Except for you and Claire. I know, I know. Am I going to get raped in the night if I leave the door unlocked?”
Søren had given her the most earnest of stares as Claire tucked herself under his arm and rested her head on his chest.
“You wouldn’t be the first person that has happened to in this house.”
Eleanor locked the door.
At about two in the afternoon, Claire returned to the bedroom carrying a plate of food for her. At six in the evening she brought another plate.
“Are you trying to get me fat, or are you looking for an excuse to get out of there?” Eleanor asked as she dived into her food.
“Mostly the second one. I hate stuff like this. I’m supposed to be sad and miserable. I’m not that good of an actress.”
“No offense, but why aren’t you sad? I mean, your dad died.” Eleanor hoped she didn’t sound judgmental. She wouldn’t be all that sad if her own father died.
Claire threw herself down on the couch next to Eleanor.
“I barely knew him. I’m glad I barely knew him.”