“And mom?”

Dan looked up for the first time in minutes as his sister broke the uneasy silence. He fiddled with the end of his tie under the table. “Won’t be out there in time. She’s been staying with aunt Jess since February and doesn’t want to fly. It takes a month or more to rent a wheelchair van.”

Freida looked out the window. The yard was still illuminated in warm afternoon light, although she knew it wouldn’t be long before the bottom of the sun became visible through the top panes. Without hesitating, or turning back to face her brother, she replied, “Okay. When are we leaving?”

Dan blinked. This wasn’t the tentative, careful-stepping Freida he’d had to cajole to leave the house during thunderstorms growing up.

“Dan? Have you looked at flights?”

Dan dropped his tie, straightened up slightly, and reminded her, “I think we need to talk about risks.”

“It’s safer now than it was a month ago. We’ll get rapids and mask when we get to him.”

“His immune system is so weak. Not to mention you see dozens of people every day at work and I have two kids in different schools – we could both have it right now and not know. Rapid tests aren’t always enough, Freida. We have to assume we have it.”

Freida angled her chair further away from Dan, craning her neck uncomfortably to try to glimpse the sun descending. Instead, her eyes fell on the two red bikes outside–one with training wheels and one with blue streamers–that her nieces begged Santa for last December. Looking back, she could pinpoint three centers of Dan’s living room that Christmas eve. One was the fire, with kids and dogs and toys and books overflowing the carpet before it, pushed in close on the coldest night of the year. One was the tree, with ornamental clutter rivaling the carpet. Freida had helped her nieces hang their clay handprints next to hers and Dan’s. Three boxes of decorations had been rifled through, and still no one had been able to find the star. The third center of the room was the mostly-ignored monitor on the table, where her parents’ fuzzy faces beamed bittersweetly at the scene in front of them. That was one of the last calls where both were in the same square.

Dan could tell Freida was lost in thought. His sister had to know visiting could be reckless, could shave further weeks off of–he didn’t like to think how much time they had left. Sighing in resignation, he said, “Stay for dinner. No, stay the night. We can talk more in the morning, when we’re both feeling less impulsive.”

“I’m going to go. You don’t have to. I don’t care if they don’t let me see him, I just want to be close. You don’t have to come.”

“In the morning. We’ll talk in the morning.”

“I want to leave tomorrow. I can’t stay, Dan. I have to pack, I don’t know how long I’ll be gone.”

No, this wasn’t the Freida he grew up protecting.

“You can pack after dinner. Let me get you another cup of tea.”

Freida handed over her mug, unsteady. She didn’t want to think at all right now. She would leave in the morning. She would cry on the plane. But tonight she would tuck in her nieces and sleep on the couch.

As Dan left the room to fill their cups and call his daughters in for dinner, Freida turned back to the window right as the edge of the setting sun dipped into view.