Hello Beautiful

Sylvie’s second reaction was anger. She had been so careful, only kissing boys, only allowing herself moments of risk-free pleasure. Julia had been planning and executing her life with military precision since grade school. Neither of them had left room for any surprises. Sylvie could see now that they’d believed their sheer example would keep Emeline and Cecelia safe, following directly behind them on the path to adulthood. Keep them careful. But that had been lazy on Sylvie’s part. She knew about third doors. If she and Julia had been marching in and out the same door, of course there was a chance that Emeline and Cecelia would find another exit. Cecelia was adorable: small and curvy. She had a generous laugh and drew portraits of her many friends for their birthdays. Boys had swarmed to her, and her older sisters hadn’t told her how and why to fend those boys off. As Charlie had said this morning, it was a tale as old as time.

Sylvie felt welded to the curb. Even when she stood up, when she walked home with her two little sisters, when she let Rose bustle her into her pink maid of honor dress and tried to improve her unruly hair, she felt like she was on that curb, watching life rush past. The library to her back, Cecelia a walking time bomb, Julia so happy she appeared to be shooting off sparks, William on the cusp of joining a new family, Rose and Charlie unaware that a new generation was already on its way. When the sun was high overhead, and Sylvie was standing at the altar — a smile affixed to her face — she was still sitting on that curb, trying to figure out if she was too late to pull everyone back.

William

March 1982–June 1982

The action — from the body angles of the players to his own leap in the air — felt so familiar that when William rose for the block, he thought, Be careful. Those words were still in his head when a colossal center with dreadlocks and goggles slammed into his chest. William was stronger than he used to be, so he shoved back, still in the air, and was propelled backward. He collided with another player and tipped sideways. When he hit the floor, he landed hard on his right knee.

Kent leaned over William and offered his hand to help him stand up. “You all right?” Kent said.

William could barely hear his friend. His knee was buzzing. He was unusually aware of the inside of his knee, which felt like a sandcastle being knocked down by a sneaky wave. He stared at the joint while the referee blew his whistle and men carried a stretcher onto the court. William had recognized the play, and now he recognized the accompanying fog, and the pain too.

He needed two surgeries, because the knee had to be reconstructed. Every time the surgeon or attending came into the hospital room, William listened carefully, wanting to understand. The knee was the only subject he could pay attention to; all other information seemed to travel from an impossible distance. He caught words, fragments, but not meaning.

He was lucky to have a hospital room to himself. Normally, a patient would have been sent home for the two weeks that separated his surgeries, but since William needed to keep his injured leg immobile and elevated, and his dorm room was up three flights of stairs, they kept him in the hospital. The nurses said a roommate might arrive at any time, but one never appeared. Kent visited when he could, but between schoolwork, basketball, and his job in the laundry room, he didn’t have much time to spare. Julia visited at least once a day, sometimes twice. She tried to make William laugh by performing an entrance: She twirled, like a ballerina entering the stage, or strode in with her chin up, playing a stern nurse. Once she came in with several books balanced on top of her head; she made it halfway across the room before they toppled. William enjoyed the entrances but didn’t need them. He was just happy she was there.

Julia brought his textbooks so he could try to keep up with his coursework. Finals were less than two months away, and then came graduation. “We’ll remember June 1982 as the best month of our lives,” Julia said. “Graduation and a wedding.” She named the two events with pleasure, savoring the solidity of the milestones. William liked it when his fiancée spoke like that; he admired how Julia saw her life as a system of highways to be expertly navigated, and he was grateful to be in her car.