Destination

Miriam watches Estelle’s fingers move. She’s always found diamonds gauche herself, but realizes now just how well they suit cool, elegant Stella. It’s been a long time since she was called that—ages since the boys stood on the mossy steps leading up to the cabins and shouted Stellaaaahhh in their best Marlon Brando voices. Estelle had pretended to hate that.

Stella. Miriam shakes her head. None of it—nothing she owns, none of the ease or luxury she’s so accustomed to could have made those last months with little Roger any easier. And Big Roger walking out so soon after, Estelle going it alone, just her and Max and that pile of blue chip stocks—a period Penny crassly referred to as Estelle’s abject prosperity. Miriam sighs, no wonder really, that Max had been so spoiled …

It seems an eternity, yet can be no more than a few minutes before the door opens. The nurse wordlessly ushers in a white-frocked woman and quickly backs out.

They stand.

“I’m Dr. Bell.”

They shake hands and peer at the small letters on the doctor’s nametag until she offers, “Melissa Bell, Oncology.”

She’s pretty, like Penny.

Once they sit, the doctor wastes no time, gives them each a pinched smile and says in a voice of practiced succor, “Your sister took her own life this morning.”

The air in the room sifts down to thicken over the table.

Dr. Bell takes three empty prescription bottles from her lab coat and places them on the formica. Two envelopes with their names written in Penny’s hand are eased from a folder and set before them. “I’m so sorry.”

Neither sister moves or speaks. After a full minute, the doctor presses a palm over each of their wrists, then rises. “I’ll be right outside, if you have any questions. Your nephews are waiting in the room, in case you’d like to view … ”

Both shake their heads and the doctor nods, edging away, “Of course. I’ll have the floor nurse tell them where to find you.”

The door bumps shut. Miriam and Estelle don’t acknowledge the pill bottles, or the envelopes, or each other. Their gazes drop again to hands, this time their own.

Estelle stares at the facet of a large ruby, Roger Junior’s birthstone. She spreads her hand flat. Well, that’s that. Ro-joe, Aunt Pretty’s coming to join you… She hadn’t thought before, but now is suddenly glad that Penny and little Roger are together—that her boy will no longer be alone. That Penny won’t be. Just as unexpectedly, the thing Estelle has most struggled for all day comes to her with more clarity and vividness than seem possible—Penny’s face, her girl-face, bolts into focus. A scene fills in around her little sister.

She and Miriam are cross-legged on the porch floor of cabin two. Penny is on her knees, laughing and pressing a raw hotdog through the mesh of the screen door. On the other side is Dandy, the resort’s old brown Lab, frantically lapping and scraping his teeth against the metal. Sunlight lashing from his tail flickers across Penny’s nose and chin. That face. Even the smells come back to Estelle; scents of rain, of mice and hotdogs. Her eyes close like shutters to seal the moment. How could I have forgotten that?

Across the table, Miriam is studying her thumbs. A shriek of familiar laughter pricks the cotton wool that has muffled any recall of Penny’s voice. Miriam sits up. She can hear Penny perfectly now, as if the volume from the past has suddenly swelled, clear as if her sister is next to her, snorting and hysterical. She can hear Dandy, too, the gross squelching noise—the rasps of tongue, muzzle and teeth.

Squatting in front of them, Penny can barely catch enough breath for one small word, “See?” Penny says, the pitch of her voice high and nasal with allergies.

She pivots toward them, her sneakers making rubbery squeals on the floorboards. The hotdog is gone, wax wrapper crinkling under Penny’s heel. Her palm is still on the screen, but she’s only teasing Dandy now, enjoying the tickle of each desperate lash of his tongue. She looks squarely at her sisters this time, demanding an answer, “See?”

She is eight years old, nothing important has happened to her—her big teeth aren’t even all in yet. Her legs are folded reeds with scabbed kneecaps and her eyes are fierce with this one moment. A bit of hotdog is caught in her bangs and tears of laughter lacquer her freckles.

This is not a memory. Estelle and Miriam see her clearly, hear her perfectly. Penny is laughing the pure kind of laughter that can make her wet her pants. She is helpless with it.

It’s infectious. They can hardly help themselves. Jeweled and mottled hands reach blindly to link as the smooth, small pair slips away.

Sarah Stonich’s novels include These Granite Islands and The Ice Chorus, both published by Little, Brown & Co. “Destination” is from Vacationland, a forthcoming volume of stories connecting a number of characters to the same Northern Minnesota resort. Stonich lives in Minneapolis with her husband, Jon Ware. For more, visit www.sarahstonich.com