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       ELVIRA

   

   I will not let her bother me.  There will be chicken and baked beans and macaroni and cheese and Art'll make burgers and this ham and that jello stuff that Janice makes so nice and some kind of casserole and cake and I will not let her bother me.  Crying in that dishwater she calls iced tea won't do.  If she starts up, I'll fill up my plate and talk to somebody else.

    The station wagon is there; I can see it through the elms in Plummer's yard, but I can't see the Chevelle.  I saw Dougie and Eric go off a while ago.  Either they aren't back yet or they parked around the side to make room for the other cars.

    Elvira, I tell myself, She's your sister and the love of sisters is something that time and dollars and miles and words don't change.  For Daddy, if for nothing else, we ought to make the effort.  So I smile and she smiles and the sister's love is there in us somewhere, caught up and smothered by something neither of us had anything to do with.  We are not so different really; she has her reasons, but they are so old and tired they are just like wilted lettuce; they won't do anymore.  They're just sad and pitiful now.  So long as there were tears they were enough, but it's just squeezed out.

    She don't have the excuse anymore; she's just like that.  I cried too, but I stopped when I knew that she was wrong, when the crying wasn't for the baby anymore.  But she goes on inside, keeping the only caring she can muster for something gone.  It's not natural.  I told her that once and she acted like she didn't know what I meant, putting the fork on the proper side and straightening the napkins and saying, Whatever do you mean, Elvira?  Then she laughed, and I had to leave the room; I felt sick.

    Yes, sister's love.  I know it is in there and tell myself that it is stronger than whatever she has inside her.  I tell myself that and wait for my son to return so I will not be alone when I take my ham and go up there.