Kathleen Creighton: One Summer’s Knight

But Bella was cradling the paper bag as if it contained the crown jewels. “Oh, Sumz, you didn’t have to do this.”

Summer couldn’t look at her. “The kids have something for you, too. Refrigerator magnets with their pictures on them They made a card.” Keeping her back turned. Keeping her distance. Don’t hug me, Bella, please don’t hug me. If you make me cry, I’ll never forgive you.

From behind her she heard a huffed-out breath, a small laugh, quivery with unexpected emotion. Bella? Sentimental? Oh, God, what did that mean?

But all her sister said was “Well. This is so nice. My very first anniversary present. Thank you.” And after a moment she added, “You didn’t bring the beasts?”

Blinking away the tickle of tears, Summer straightened with her arms full and said lightly, “I assume you mean the furred and-feathered kind? The vet I work for was kind enough to keep them for the weekend.”

“Nice of him,” said Mirabella, her voice carefully neutral. There was a pause, filled with the hum of a June afternoon, punctuated with the nearby yips and cries of romping children. And then her voice came softly, oddly tentative for Bella. “Sumz? You okay?”

Caught off guard, Summer threw her a look of genuine surprise. The Bella she knew from childhood had never been so sensitive to the moods of others. “Yeah, sure. Why?”

“You sure? This is your sister talking-The Sisters Waskowitz, remember?”

Just for a heartbeat, Summer’s resolve wavered. The old childhood nickname along with her sister’s tone of unwonted concern had almost thrown her for a minute; it was going to take a while to get used to this kinder, gentler Mirabella.

She felt a sudden wave of emotion-nostalgia, but with sadness in it, and regret, too. The Sisters Waskowitz. That was how they’d been known in the small California desert town where they’d spent their growing-up years. The police chiefs kids-two tall blondes and one short, spunky redhead. Evie, with her venturesome spirit and flair for the dramatic, always into something new and outrageous, like as not making the local papers, setting the standard of infamy for her sisters to live up to and the town on its ear in the bargain. Mirabella, the redhead, the brain, the feisty, pint-size dynamo with the king-size chip on her shoulder. And finally, Summer, quieter than her sisters, the one everyone depended on, the one people came to with their troubles. Summer, who could fix things- and animals. Summer, who would always find a way to make it better.

The Sisters Waskowitz. The three of them, so different, and yet so close. As children, anyway. What had happened to them? How was it that as adults they’d grown so far apart? Until Bella’s wedding last summer, it had been years since they’d been in close and frequent touch.

Suddenly, as if her thoughts had been wandering along similar paths, Mirabella said, “Have you heard from Evie?”

“Not for a while.” Summer nudged the car door closed with her hip. “Last I heard, I think she was in Vegas.”

“Here, let me take something… Vegas? That’s not so bad.”

Summer gave a short laugh as she relinquished a pillow and a plastic grocery sack full of fast-food trash; compared to some of the places their sister’s career as a documentary filmmaker had taken her, Las Vegas did seem reasonably tame.

They were walking slowly toward the house when Mirabella frowned and added, “So, you’d think she’d call.”

This time, Summer’s one-note laugh said, Evie? Our Evie? You’ve got to be kidding’ “Oh, you know,” she said, smiling at the ground, “Evie immerses herself in her work.” Neither would ever think to call their sister selfish-it was just her way She let a beat or two go by, then slanted a look at her sister. “Are Charly and Troy here?” It was the right timing and she kept it casual, but under her ribs she could feel her heart quicken as she waited for the answer. If anyone could help her now, Troy and Charly could. Not only was Charly a lawyer, but Troy was a private investigator. And hadn’t she heard someone say that he’d once been a navy SEAL?

Mirabella’s smile tilted wryly. “They’re upstairs. Charly’s lying down. She hasn’t been feeling too well.”

Summer’s heart gave a lurch. She could feel it now, tap-tapping away at the base of her throat. “Oh? What’s the matter? She’s not sick, is she?” Please don’t let her be sick. Not now. Not when I need her so badly.

Mirabella gave a little gasp of chagrin. “Oh, God, that’s right, I haven’t told you the news-Charly’s pregnant!”

“Pregnant…” Summer’s heart sank into her stomach, where it continued to pulse away, now a dismal little drumbeat. “That’s… wonderful.”

“Well, I’m not sure she thinks it’s so wonderful at the moment. From what I understand, she had a pretty lousy couple of months with her first, and that was more than twenty years ago. Anyway, the doctors have told her to take it easy, at least for the first trimester.”

Charly’s pregnant… Well, that’s it, then, Summer thought. I can’t possibly ask her I can’t. She felt curiously numb. Almost relieved.

“It’s no picnic, being pregnant at thirty-seven. Believe me, I know,” Mirabella, was saying in a tone half vexed, half musing, almost as if she were talking to herself.

Summer, finding herself in the lead all of a sudden, paused to look back at her sister. Mirabella had halted and was holding her hair back from her face with one hand clamped to the top of her head, something she’d always done, Summer remembered, when she was agitated. And there was that dewy flush on her forehead, and the purple smudges under her eyes that were not berry stains. One thing about Bella’s skin-it was so fair and fine, when anything troubled her, physical or emotional, it showed up on her skin like a video on a screen

They were almost to the porch steps. Summer took a breath to bolster her courage; confronting Mirabella could be a daunting prospect. “Bella?” she said in a low voice. “Is everything okay?”

Mirabella’s shoulders rose with a gusty and impatient sigh “Of course it is. I told you.” And she would have plowed on in her typical steamroller fashion if Summer’s hand on her arm hadn’t kept her from it. Having no choice then, she paused, looking much put-upon. Looking up, looking down, looking anywhere but at her “little” sister.

Summer almost smiled; this was familiar territory, a familiar role to her in spite of their relative ages, that of confidant and sometimes surrogate mother. Their parents, loving and devoted in their own way, had been firm believers in the “benign neglect” school of child-rearing; always there when it really counted, they’d never hovered or coddled, most of the time leaving their daughters to deal with minor problems on their own. Which had undoubtedly contributed to the degree of confidence and success with which all three had eventually launched themselves into the adult world. And which also, it suddenly occurred to Summer, may have been the key to the sisters’ closeness, all those years ago. They’d learned very early two important truths: that three heads really were better than one, and that there had sometimes been safety in numbers. How had they all forgotten that?

“Bella? Come on, now, this is Summer talking. Tell me what’s wrong.”

Mirabella gave one more sigh, threw a guilty look over her shoulder in the direction of the open kitchen door, then lowered her voice and snapped in her typical machine-gun fashion, “Nothing’s wrong. I’m just worried about Jimmy Joe, is all. I mean, you know, his business is growing so fast, and he’s stuck behind a desk most of the time, and he has so much on his mind, and I don’t know if he’s happy-” she gulped a breath “-and I’m afraid I might be pregnant, too.”