Page 22 of The Starfish Sisters

Yul Brynner sprawls over her legs. He meows at me. “I bet you’re hungry,” I say. “Come on.”

He leaps down easily and follows me out. We trip downstairs, where Jasmine is eating oatmeal with berries while watching her iPad with headphones. She sees the cat and her mouth drops open. “Where did he come from?” She yanks off the earphones and drops to the floor, pettingYul Brynner. “Oh my gosh, he’s so soft!” He lifts his head and she bends to kiss him, giggling when he licks her nose. “What’s his name?”

“Yul Brynner.” At the weird look she gives me, I say, “It’s a long story. He was an actor who was in a very famous movie Suze and I loved.The King and I.”

“Oh. Can I feed him?”

“Yes. She brought some food. It’s in the cans over there. You can use a saucer.” When Maui trots into the room, Yul Brynner holds his ground. Maui bends to sniff him, and they touch noses.

“How cute!” Jasmine cries. “Did Auntie Suze spend the night?”

“She did.” I scrape food into the dish Suze left out and shoo Maui away so Yul Brynner can eat. Such an awkwardly long name, but she never just calls him Yul, so I won’t, either. “Eat your breakfast, sweetheart. Let him eat.”

She gets back up. “I wish I could have a cat.”

I nod, washing my hands. “Maybe when you come back to the States.”

“Why can’t I have one in England? Maybe that would make me feel better.”

“Maybe.” I half smile—she’s not above a little emotional manipulation. “Better to wait and see.”

Her face falls, and this time it’s not manipulation but genuine sadness. It creeps over her face like dusk. “I don’t want to go so far away.”

“I know, baby. But it’s going to be an amazing adventure.” To redirect, I add, “Suze always, always, always wanted a cat and her dad would never let her have one. My grandmother let her keep one here.”

“Really? What kind of cat?”

“It was a tuxedo.”

She wrinkles her nose. “What’s that?”

“Black and white. A white ruff. Peter.” I remember him as a kitten, one of a litter born at the hippie house, a place we all hung out the summer before Suze was sent away—a party house, really, but not in abad way. Not like a party house would be now. The kittens lived in the barn, and we all adored them. Peter was the imp of the group, always getting into predicaments and causing trouble. Suze loved him from the very first time she saw him. He had a half mustache and a spot of white right on his forehead, like a horse, and socks on all four feet. Suze begged her father for weeks to keep that kitten, and finally she went to Beryl, who kept books and the diary and clothes for Suze.

We walked over from the hippie house, Peter in a box. He was only a couple of months old, but the kids who lived there wanted to get the kittens into good homes, and Suze begged them not to give him away yet.

“Do you think she’ll say yes?” Suze asked.

I really didn’t think she would. Even my grandmother had limits to the nice things she’d do for other people, and she already had a cat, a gray mouser who presented us with dead or half-living rodents weekly. “I don’t know,” I said.

Suze got tears in her eyes. “But he’s so cute and he loves me!”

“He does.”

We found Beryl in the studio, as ever, where she was bent over her table drawing the intricate details of a dragonfly wing. “Hello, girls,” she said, straightening. “What have we here?”

Suze carried the box over. “This is Peter”—a name she took from Anne Frank’s diary. “I love him so much and my dad won’t let me keep any kind of animal, and maybe I wouldn’t want a kitten around him anyway.”

“Oh, baby.” Beryl set aside her pencil and gave Peter her full attention. She lifted him from the box and settled him on her shoulder. “He’s a cutie pie, isn’t he?” Peter lifted a paw and gently touched her lips, purring. She stroked his tummy. “You want me to adopt him, is that it?”

“Not exactly,” Suze said. “I want him to be my cat, but he has to live here. I’ll buy his food and get him fixed and all that.”

I leaned on the table, lacing Peter’s tail through my fingers. It twitched in my hand. I wanted the cat to stay, but it felt like Suze alwaysgot the best of Beryl these days. If I’d asked her to keep a kitten for me, would she have done it? I didn’t think she would have.

But then, my father wasn’t whipping me with a belt for minor infractions, either. Or any infraction for that matter. Maybe, I thought, kissing Peter’s tiny nose, I should get over myself.

Suze waited. You could see on her face that she didn’t think it would work, but then Beryl said, “I don’t mind. He can live here and be your cat.”

Suze burst into tears, crying so hard she had to put her face down on her hands on the table. Beryl set Peter down and he frolicked right over and dived into Suze’s hair. She picked him up, laughing and crying at once, and kissed him all over his face. He set his paws on either side of her chin and licked her tears.