Brother and Sister Read Online Free PDF

It was the same house all right -- he was home.
     
    Angie ran to him, her eyes puffy and red from crying, and she clung to him, sobbing, “You’re home! Paul! I’m so glad you’re home!”
     
    He put his arms around her. “I’m home for good,” he said, closing his eyes and burying his face in her hair.
     

 
    THREE
     
    The funeral was on Wednesday. It was the wrong kind of day for it. Funerals should take place on rainy days, with a chill in the air and a look of brown-dying fall on the face of the world. There should be mud, and looming gray cloud banks filling the sky, and the few passers-by on the streets should be huddled miserably within their coats, clutching fast to their own guttering sparks of life. There should be the sorrowful repetitive sound of automobile windshield wipers, and the sorrowful, persistent sound of rain dripping down from rotting eaves.
     
    That is the kind of day which should be set aside for Funerals -- it was not the kind of day on which the Danes were laid to rest.
     
    Angie awoke on Wednesday morning to the treble singing of birds. Sunlight, gay and warm and brimming with life, tumbled sportively through the bedroom window, gleaming like caramel on the wooden floor. The air was bright, the mirror over the dresser sparkled, the gaily colored kewpie doll Bob had won for her last year grinned and winked at her from atop the bureau.
     
    At first she didn’t remember. Her eyes opened. Feeling rested and warm, she snuggled beneath the top sheet. It was a beautiful day, warm without being muggy. She threw back the sheet and bounced out of bed, young and vibrant in white pajamas. She caught her reflection in the dresser mirror and smiled at it, happy to see herself, happy to have the knowledge reaffirmed that she was young and lithe and lovely.
     
    She spun in an impromptu dance step and stopped all at once when she saw the clothes on the chair, waiting to be put on.
     
    Her black wool skirt. Her black wool sweater. Her black cotton stockings, worn only once before, last Hallowe’en. And, on the floor next to the chair, her old black flat shoes.
     
    She looked at the clothes awaiting her. They were like the tolling of some grim Puritan bell, like the burnt-flesh reek of Salem.
     
    Then she remembered.
     
    Suddenly emptied, like an overturned jug of cream, she stripped off the white pajamas and bound herself in black. When she looked in the mirror, her blond hair was nasty -- it was laughing when it should have been subdued. She searched through the dresser and the bureau, but could find nothing black to cover the too-alive hair. The best she could do was a gray bandanna.
    She donned it, tucking the stray, laughing curls beneath it, out of sight, and left her room.
     
    Aunt Sara had stayed over the last three nights, and she was now in the kitchen amid the smell of frying bacon. Paul was seated at the table, wolfing eggs, bacon and black coffee. She couldn’t understand how Paul could eat at a time like this, and Aunt Sara, just as though she were answering Angie’s unspoken question, said, “Can you imagine a boy like this? He spent all that time on his trip home, and he didn’t get any sleep at all. Only ate one hamburger and a glass of milk the whole time. Can you imagine a boy like this? How many eggs this morning, dear?”
     
    “I’m not hungry, thank you,” said Angie.
     
    “Have something, dear. You should eat something to keep your strength up.”
     
    “I’ll have a piece of toast, I guess. And some coffee.”
     
    “All right, you sit down right there, I’ll be just a jiffy.” And Aunt Sara went bustling around the kitchen.
     
    Angie sat down across from her brother. “Hello, Paul,” she said.
     
    He gave her a wan smile. “Hello, yourself.”
     
    She studied him as he ate. It had been a long while since she’d seen him, and the changes in him were startling. Last night things had happened too rapidly. Their meeting had been too emotional for her to