Chapter 9 - Michael remembers his sister
Michael had an older sister.
Rebecca.
She died in a car accident at twenty-four.
I knew her only from photographs.
One night Michael sat at the kitchen table after the children were asleep.
He said:
“Mom did this to Rebecca.”
“What?”
“Not hitting.”
He rubbed his face.
“The boy thing.”
Michael got the larger bedroom growing up.
Reason:
He would “need space when he had a family.”
Rebecca was expected to help cook.
Michael was not.
Rebecca’s college boyfriend received lectures about whether he could “support her.”
Michael’s girlfriends were asked whether they were good enough for him.
After Rebecca married, Sarah told her:
“You’re a Whitmore now.”
As though being a daughter could expire.
Michael said:
“I thought Mom was just from another generation.”
I answered:
May you like
“She’s alive in this one.”
He nodded.
