Vera Carol Edgarian (great novels of all time txt) 📖

over the house. In the parlor, Ricky sang from his new favorite perch on the mantel. Pie and LowNaa were playing cards at the table by the broken bay windows. A cool afternoon breeze flowed into the room unimpeded. Pie had wrapped herself in one of Rose’s furs, while LowNaa had a crocheted blanket draped across his shoulders. The flap-flap of the cards, mixed with Ricky’s incessant chirps, made a kind of music. I looked on without them noticing me.

They were playing Beggar My Neighbor, one of Morie’s favorite games. When Pie lost the next hand, she cursed LowNaa in Swedish, calling him in a lilting, tender voice a din jävla skit, or devilish shit boot.

LowNaa grinned as he replied in Cantonese. Back and forth they spoke, in tongues neither understood.

“Va’ fan?” I called to my sister. What the hell.

“There you are!” she cried. “How long have you been standing there? Is she awake?”

I could only nod, the exhaustion hitting me all at once.

“V?”

“Mmm.”

“Rose… is she talking?” Pie turned, giving me her full attention, while LowNaa dealt the next hand.

“Yeah,” I said, “she’s talking.”

“Is she… herself? I mean, does she know what’s happened? Did you tell her about Morie?”

I sighed. “I told her everything, but I doubt she’ll remember.”

Pie nodded. “You should get some sleep.” She squinted at me and I understood without her having to tell me again that I looked ragged.

I went to the kitchen to get some tea. Lifang was there, eavesdropping, of course; when she saw me, she turned, squatted on her heels, and attacked one of the many dirty pots scattered on the floor.

“Who’s that on the roof?” I asked. For days there had been persistent tapping.

“Bobby,” Lifang said. Bobby was fixing the hole left by the witch’s cap, and when he finished each day he was hungry—very, very hungry, she explained accusingly. Which meant more pots for her father to cook with and for Lifang to clean.

Lifang went on scrubbing a soup pot, its sides so deep, she had to use her whole arm to reach its bottom. She’d scour it using a rag and only a few scant drops of water. She’d work till it sparkled, her every movement a mixture of rage and pride—a tiny, complete revolution.

The one thing Lifang couldn’t control was her desire for something better than pots. As she scrubbed, her gaze kept turning to the ceiling—to Rose.

Lifang had stayed back those first weeks, letting me be the one to change Rose’s soiled bandages and catheter. Lifang let me trick myself into thinking Rose was mine.

But Rose was never mine and Lifang had only been waiting. How badly she wanted to ask about Rose, but wouldn’t; she wouldn’t allow me the satisfaction of knowing more than she did. Now that Rose was conscious, she would have no qualms about using Rose’s convalescence as a way to escape the tedium of her father’s kitchen.

As proof, on the table, she’d put up a tray with a fresh lace cloth napkin and a bud vase of flowers and a steeping bowl of broth. Floating at the top of the soup were little shavings of ginger and green onion.

“That for her?” I asked. “Too bad. She’s asleep.”

Lifang glanced at the ceiling and shrugged. But I understood. Desire was our common language. She would wait for as long as it took, until she had tithed herself to the madam.

A shiver ran through me as I imagined her upstairs, snuggling with Rose, or polishing her nails—all the girlie things I couldn’t bring myself to do. Lifang would tell Rose what she thought she ought to know—the version of things that showed her in the best light, of course. She’d tell Rose how hard she’d been working, while Pie and I lazed. She’d claim that she, Tan, and LowNaa were the only ones keeping the wolf from the door.

Oh, my father is so tired, she’d say. I am so tired too, scrubbing and cleaning, day and night. Of course, I am not as lovely as I used to be.

Don’t be silly, my darling, Rose would assure her. You are as lovely as ever.

I saw it in my mind’s eye and in my mind it had already happened.

I paused with my hand on the back door. How curious I felt, how strange. Competing with Lifang for the madam’s attention wasn’t as compelling to me as it was on the afternoon we met, when the two of us foolishly pressed our claims with Rose. Could it really have been only a month earlier?

I had waited for Rose, longed for her, tended to her. Now, it seemed, I might be ready to let her go. That surprised me too.

“Lifang, your grandfather. Does he understand what Pie is saying?”

Lifang answered with a stern shake of the head.

“That’s a relief,” I said. “And what does he say to her?”

“My grandfather, he is sick of being alive,” Lifang declared, tossing her rag on the floor as she climbed to her feet. “He says your sister cheats at cards. He says, ‘The skinny Swede talks dirty with a hungry, cheater’s mouth.’ ”

Lifang crossed her arms and glared, letting me know she considered herself my equal—perhaps better than my equal.

Now it was my turn to shrug. I didn’t care a fig who was up or down. I had never thought of Lifang as less. In all the ways that mattered to me, she was richer. Her father and grandfather looked out for her, sacrificed for her, adored her. Yet she was greedy and wanted more. Did I blame her for wanting to take Rose for herself? I did.

“What are you staring at, bug-bug?” she griped. Mocking me, she grabbed two fistfuls of her silky hair and held them above her head, imitating the knotted mess of my bun.

I swung past her, seized that delicious bowl of soup in two hands, and gulped it down. I wiped my mouth with the perfect napkin, and set the bowl on the floor next to the piles of pots.