Marg’s wool skirt pulled tightly across her ass and her sweater clung to her breasts; Sylvia didn’t like the look but she supposed some could find it flattering. Marg had gained weight over time so that now, even though she was four years younger than Sylvia, she seemed older. Her hair had dried and frizzed; she had “eggplant” highlights—a recent experiment—mixed in with brown, red, and gray, all pinned down with three haphazard barrettes. Her skin looked dry after the long winter, and yet still she managed to have a vitality that did not diminish with age.
They lived in a university town and Marg taught in the linguistics department. Sylvia was still trying to find herself, she sometimes told Marg jokingly, half-jokingly, or seriously, depending on her mood. Sylvia had worked at the Shepherds of Good Hope doling out food and changing beds; she had worked at the AIDS Relief Shack, on the second floor above the town’s main grocery, a big room with couches, water dispensers alongside free condom dispensers, and a constantly shuttered light from the new high rises—only seven stories but high rises for the town nonetheless—that had gone up across the street. She had travelled; she had raised her kids; and she had managed, through it all, to work as the circulation manager for the community newspaper. (Once a month 7,000 papers arrived on her doorstep and over the next week, neighborhood children came and collected their bundles and delivered them door-to-door with Sylvia and her kids picking up the slack. The bundles, tied tightly with plastic twine, filled their living room, their dining room, and spilled over into the kitchen, the children’s bedrooms, the bathroom.) For most of this time, Sylvia had lived with Marg’s husband. It was not something that they often talked about.
Marg sipped her coffee. The color in her face, heightened by the weather, was returning to normal. She still commanded a sort of erotic attention, from her confidence alone, Sylvia thought, and she had a way of moving that Sylvia envied. She possessed the room. Sylvia had read that line once and it described her sister exactly. Marg stood out in bold, electric outline. Sometimes it was a good thing and sometimes it was not. She could be loud, she could be unwittingly offensive, she could be negligent. Certainly she had been negligent of her husband.
“You’re quiet, Sylvia. Are you mad? Have you been waiting long? I am sorry. I tried to get out and then I tried your cell but it went straight to voicemail.”
“I have something I have to tell you.”
“Oh?”
They both leaned forward a little.