The Good Wife(68)

They shouldn’t have.

But at the same time this was Brianna’s fault. She could have gotten help earlier. She could have taken care of herself. For God’s sake, she was an infectious disease nurse. She treated critically ill patients in Africa. Why didn’t she treat herself?

Dad stopped before them, standing above them, blocking the brightness of the sun. “Well?” he prompted.

“It’s nothing, Dad,” Sarah said. “Just a sister thing.”

“You called her selfish,” he said. “And careless,” he added. “Those are strong words.”

A lump filled Sarah’s throat. It hurt, swallowing around it. “I’m tired of her living in Africa.” She jerked her chin up, looked at her father and then at Brianna. “I’m tired of her living halfway around the world and only seeing us once every couple of years. I think it’s selfish. We miss her.” She got to her feet, stepped around her dad, and gave Brianna another long, hard look. “I miss her.”

And then she headed back into the house and down a flight of stairs to the alcove bedroom that had always been hers. Meg, Kit, and Brianna had shared a large bedroom, but when Sarah was born, her father converted a closet and a storage area under the stairs into a cozy nursery, cutting a window into the storage space to bring in natural light.

The nursery was just supposed to be a temporary room. It was tiny and filled with odd angles from being tucked under the stairs and into the eaves, but Sarah loved her room with its slanted ceiling and little window nook and refused to move up into the “big girls” room when she’d outgrown her toddler bed.

Mom hadn’t been happy at first, as she’d looked forward to turning the nursery into an office for herself, but Dad convinced her that Sarah, being so much younger than the other kids, needed her own space.

Now Sarah flopped onto her bed and stared numbly up at the floral wallpaper on the angled ceiling, unable to process what Brianna had just said, because no, hepatitis C wasn’t a death sentence, but you couldn’t let it ravage your body for months, much less years, and Sarah wondered just how long Brianna had been sick. Her gut told her it had been a long, long time.

A knock sounded on her door, and the bedroom door opened. “Can I come in?”

It was her dad.

Sarah sat up. “Yes.”

He entered and closed the door behind him, ducking his head to avoid hitting it on a sharply angle.

“I forgot how small the Dollhouse is,” he said, stooping as he approached her bed.

She smiled faintly at his use of her bedroom’s nickname. Tommy had called her room the Dollhouse years ago, citing its Lilliputian dimensions and quirky charm. “It’s cozy.”

“You don’t have to stay here. There’s plenty of space in the girls’ room.”

“I like it here. It’s my room.”

He looked around, taking in the peach-and-yellow wallpaper and the dotted curtain. “You know we were going to demo this room, and add the space to our master bath when we did that big remodel.”

“I know. I’m glad it didn’t happen.”

“Your mom wanted a big Jacuzzi.”

That hurt. Sarah felt bruised. “She deserved one.”

“She was a good girl, your mom.”

It took her a second to respond. “Yes. She was.”

He gave her a sharp look. “You miss her.”

“I do.”

“You two were constantly on the phone. Had to up our Verizon plan’s minutes twice because of all your talking and texting.”

Sarah struggled to hold back the tears. “I think about her all the time. I still reach for the phone to call her, or I think, ‘I’ve got to tell Mom this . . .’” She looked up at her dad, emotions tangled and bittersweet. “It’s just so hard. I want to hear her voice. I want her advice. I want to know how you are, and what you guys are doing. And Mom would tell me all that, and more. She was so good at staying in touch, keeping me informed. It didn’t feel like I lived on the other side of the country. Mom made me feel close.”

He folded his arms across his big chest. “I’m not very good at that, am I?”

“You’re a guy. You’ve never liked talking on the phone.”

He nodded and ran a hand through his thick hair, which he still kept short, even though he’d retired from the department earlier in the year. “I should call you more. Check in more often. Make sure we do that keep-in-touch thing your mom was so good at.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I want to. So how often should I do this? Daily—”

“Daddy, get real.”