Tina and Chloe did not move into our home so much as overtake it. Suddenly there were new curtains in the den, new labels on pantry shelves, new rules about shoes in the hallway and napkins at dinner and how much ice belonged in lemonade. The china cabinet was rearranged. Family photographs were replaced, then replaced again. My mother’s old quilts disappeared from the guest room. Tina called these changes freshening up. My father called them necessary. I called them erasure, but only in my head.
Chloe adapted instantly because it had never been her house to mourn. She unpacked new clothes into the bedroom across from mine, lined her makeup and jewelry across the dresser, and floated through the hallways with a brightness that made adults smile involuntarily. She knew how to tilt her head when complimented. She knew how to laugh at the right volume. She knew how to let gratitude glitter just enough that any kindness offered to her felt magnified in return. Where I had become quieter after my mother died, Chloe grew louder, and because louder is easier to reward than sorrow, she won the room every time.
A year after Tina arrived, my half brother Mason was born. He was red-faced, loud-lunged, and innocent of the hierarchy into which he had entered. I tried to love him in the quiet, careful way older sisters are supposed to, and for the most part I did. But his arrival sealed something already taking shape in the house. He belonged to the new family photograph. Chloe belonged to the future. Tina belonged to management. My father belonged wherever he was most needed to affirm the life he had chosen next.
I belonged to whatever work was left over.