Read Online Crazy in Love by Luanne Rice - Free Book Online

years?” The idea of it delighted me.
    “It was interesting, to say the least. I couldn’t believe it then, and I hardly believe it now. The phone has been ringing off the hook. You can’t imagine.”
    “Sure I can! I’m sure every reporter in New York wants to hear your story.”
    “But only one of us wants to tell it.” Pregnant pause.
    “That’s you, I take it?”
    “Yes. You see, I’m the one my parents kept, and Herself is sulking over the fact. She’s refusing to talk to any reporters at all. And believe me, the offers are much more lucrative if we talk together.”
    “Your parents gave up one of their twins? Do you mind if I ask why?”
    “We were on Ellis Island. Need I say more? The point is, you have to get on with life. I’m living on a fixed income, so naturally I want to sell my story. But Vivian is being a regular wet blanket. She’s crying day in and day out, refusing even to get out of bed.”
    “Well, think of how happy your parents would be,” I said.
    “It’s turning out to be a mixed blessing, to say the least. We’re not getting off on the right foot one bit.”
    After we hung up I lay on the floor, watching the sun’s declining light turn the bay’s surface silver, then purple. I felt empty and sad, thinking of rootless Vivian. I imagined Vivian lying across her bed, tears streaming from her eyes. I wondered whether Vivian had at least known she was a twin; that knowledge might have mitigated the shock. I wished I had asked Doris.
    Clare’s voice came from the back door, and then she entered the room. “The little boys are sleeping out at Billy Mendillo’s house, and the big boys are flying in late tonight. What say you and I keep each other company?”
    “Good idea,” I said, rising from the floor. We walked onto the porch and sat on rattan chairs. “I just spoke to a woman who was separated from her twin on Ellis Island.”
    “How horrible.” Clare shook her head. “God, you have a lifetime with a sister—like you and me. Can you imagine if we’d never known each other?”
    “I can’t imagine that.”
    “What made you call her?”
    “Her story is about sisters. Also, it’s sensational.”
    “Ah, escaping the old ‘
Journal of Lipid Research
Syndrome,’ ” Clare said, and we both laughed. As the daughters of scientists, we had been surrounded by people who appreciated the minute, the insignificant, the esoteric. We had spent hours in the cavernous library beside Eel Pond, wandering through the stacks of scientific publications while our father did research. There were years’ worth of the
Journal of Liquid Chromotography, Geomarine Letters
, the
Journal of Great Lakes Research,
the
Journal of Insect Physiology
, the
Journal of Lipid Research
. How, I had wondered, could so many volumes be devoted to lipid research? What was lipid research? There it was, in the Marine Biological Laboratory Library, that I learned my love for the large, the grandiose, the extravagant. I had sat at one particular scarred linoleum table in the northwest corner, listening to the wind scream through the windows, watching my father work on his latest article for
Paleontology Today
. Clare would do her homework while I had fantasies of Hollywood, New York, and St. Moritz. My fantasies were panoramic, like movies by Louis B. Mayer. One daydream could include Jean-Claude Killy, Bob Dylan, Prince Charles, John Lindsay, Virginia Woolf, and Roger Tory Peterson.
    Clare and I sat on my porch, looking west across the bay. It felt comfortable to be silent with her. She hummed a tune I couldn’t recognize, something she often did when she felt relaxed.
    “Get ready for a bombshell,” I said. “Honora told me the name of Dad’s mystery woman.”
    Clare’s mouth dropped open. “She did? Oh, I’m not sure I want you to tell me who it was. We knew her, didn’t we?”
    “Yes, but her identity won’t devastate you. I promise. Want to know?”
    “I guess so.”
    “Mrs.