Lost and Found

Eli looked across the table at her sister and let the quiet secret spill from her lips, “You don’t know how many times I wished I were more like you.”

Rebekka’s fork halted half an inch above the basil and olive oil-bathed ball of bocconcini. Her left eye squinted, “What?”

Eli watched the melon slice slip from its prosciutto band and evade her fork. Her shoulders dropped. She expected to feel better after making that little confession, but she didn’t. Just like her stab at the melon, the admission missed the mark. She would go on, because Rebekka listened and didn’t judge. “You’re easy. I’m not.”

“Gee! Thanks a lot, Sis.”

Eli rolled her eyes, “Not like that — I mean, you’re fun!”

Rebekka pierced the soft cheese, hooked a teardrop tomato with the outside tine of her fork, and popped it into her mouth, where it all burst and squished. Then it disappeared. All gone. Like the final good day of summer without warning. Finished, she pushed the plate away and looked at her older sister. “What are you talking about? You’re great fun! You can do that shuffle-dance thing as well as Sophie and Daphne — you’re cool! The girls have given up on their mom — I embarrass them!”

“Yeah. I can be fun, but I have to hit the switch first. You’re always on.”

“Ok, Eli, before we go any further — while you’re feeling crap about yourself — tell me I’m prettier. Tell me I’m the beautiful one.”

“Bekoula!” The childhood name for Rebekka bounced across the table, “Of course, you’re pretty — you’re gorgeous!” Eli meant it. Rebekka was petite, like their mother, curvaceous, with eyes like jade ever glimmering beneath a wild, luxurious mane of black-as-night curls. Everything about her younger sister said, “Come here and grab hold!”

Rebekka swiped a hand in the air, “Pssh! I’m cute. You’re the goddess, Elisia. Papa’s favourite. Mama’s Zouzouni. Papa calls me his ‘salty little eggplant with eyes like stuffed olives’ and you the ‘his mermaid with hair gold like Thessalonian wheat.’”

Eli shook her head, “That’s just Papa’s Chef talk. He relates everything to food and the old country.”

Rebekka balked. Raising her hands, palms up, and twisting in her chair, she displayed the posh dining room, “And this place? Papa named it after you — his firstborn, his angel — ‘Elysium’ for Elisia — his paradise!”

Eli’s elbows thunked atop the white cotton-covered table, and she buried her face in her hands. “Ugh! Papa is so—"

“—Greek,” Rebekka giggled, “Papa is Greek. That’s it, and that’s all.” She paused and closed a hand on Eli’s wrist, “What is this about, really? You have a great life! Aside from having the legs of a model and a gorgeous, flawless face, you’re a successful, strong, intelligent woman, and you have a great guy.”

Eli withdrew, her shoulders leaning into the chair’s upholstered back, “Nothing. Stupid. First world problem if there ever was one.” She shrugged.

Rebekka did the same but kept her eyes on Eli, examining body language the way she did with her daughter after a night out with a new boy, “Unless I’m wrong and Danny isn’t a great guy. Is that it? Is Danny secretly a jerk? Is he mean to you? Has he hurt you?”

Eli fanned slender fingers, “Danny is fine. He’s great. Hasn’t so much as raised his voice at me in two years — it’s not Danny.”

This wasn’t the big sister Rebekka was used to. Eli was beautiful. Not an opinion; fact. Incredible eyes, beautiful golden hair, shapely legs, slim hips, with height and elegance to go with. Plus, Rebekka envied her sister’s perfect, teacup breasts that would never dive for the cellar, like hers.

After four kids, two jobs, and a father who kept her fridge stocked with food and pastries, Rebekka knew she had what the kids these days affectionately called a ‘Dump truck’ for a rear end. While almost infuriatingly to Rebekka, at 45, Eli, quite possibly blessed by the Greek Gods that her father loved talking about, still had the butt of a 25-year-old; Eli’s was a Porsche.

Contrary to what Eli thought, Rebekka felt her life was a firestorm of chaos with her two sons, and two daughters — all of them teenagers, a husband who ran a contracting business, for which she kept the books as well as the house, and a full-time job of her own at the Hospice. From one day to the next, she didn’t know who was coming or going, living or dying.

“You’re staring at me the way you did when you thought I read your diary.”

“Then say something, Eli, because the only one talking is my stomach, and it’s begging for Ekmek Kataifi.”

“You don’t have to go?”

“Go? Are you kidding? The house is a zoo — this is a vacation! I’m ordering. Coffee too. Talk, Zouzouni!” Rebekka smiled and waved at the waitress.

The waitress left the table with a double order of the Greek custard pastry, coffee and two sets of critical eyes on her back.

“She’s pretty,” Eli said.

“And young,” Rebekka added. “Mama seethes when she comes in, and Papa shrugs. Rebekka hunched, throwing her hands in the air, mimicking her father, and dropping her shoulders and her voice, huffed, “What do you want, Cora? In paradise, you have swans, not ostriches!”

The waitress returned with the order, and the sisters giggled. After each took a forkful of the airy cream custard atop the crackling, almond and sugar-coated pastry and released simultaneous “Mmms,” Rebekka wagged her fork at Eli, “Talk!”

Eli sipped her coffee, set it down and sighed, “Peonies. My problem is peonies.”

“What — the flower?”

Nodding, Eli continued, “Yes. A gorgeous arrangement — living, no less, arrived at my office.”

“That seems very nice — why is that a problem?”

Eli chopped a hunk of pastry with the side of her fork. “Because they were delivered on September 26th!”

“From whom?”

“From him! Who else could it be?”

Rebekka, intrigued but a step behind her suddenly neurotic sister, forked in more pastry and flicked away an errant, dark-haired curl from an eyebrow. When the culinary pause ended without further information, she reengaged Eli. “I feel like you expect me to know who you’re talking about, and what’s September 26th?”

“A reminder of my one and only date with Sebastian — eons ago — and he’s back in town.”

“Sebastian? I don’t — oh wait. Yes, Sebastian, I remember him a bit — wasn’t he the boy in love with you back in high school? When did this happen?”

“I was almost 30,” Eli replied, “almost grown up, and Sebastian was anything but a kid.”

Rebekka’s eyebrows rose, “You never told me you two dated.”

“Because we didn’t. It was one date — not even a date, he just caught me between things with nothing better to do. Nothing happened anyway. It was a dinner; two friends having a catch-up.”

The sisters finished their desserts and coffees; neither spoke.

Rebekka dabbed a spot of custard from the corner of her mouth. Sated, she leaned forward, elbows on the table, twining her fingers into a bridge. “We have the who, and the when. Now, give me ‘why’ the peonies.”

Nodding lightly, Eli turned and looked out the window. “On that date, the restaurant had flower boxes on the deck, peonies. I felt like I could tell Sebastian anything. Everything. It was nothing but idle chit chat, and I mentioned that they were my favourite flowers. I couldn’t tell you what I wore or how he looked. Can’t recall the food: no kiss, or even an awkward pause for one. But I remember driving home, and it was funny because I had such a nice time, and I realized I was feeling sad. Because it was over. Because I could have sat and talked to him all night — he was easy.”

Eli jumped, almost throwing herself onto the table, her eyes wide with alarm, her fingers clutching Rebekka’s. “What if I told you it was the best date I’d ever had in my entire life, before or after? What if I told you that for about thirty seconds on that date, I thought ‘if he asked me to jump on a plane and follow him to Alaska, I would’? What if I told you that even on perfectly good nights, with me wanting nothing more in my life, I sometimes thought of him?”

“But after the date? Nothing? He didn’t call?”

“He actually was leaving for Alaska. I was flying south for a convention. His life went one way, mine the other.”

Rebekka nodded, “And now, after all that time, he’s back.” She watched Eli’s eyes dampen, and her slight overbite settle on her bottom lip. It was something Eli never had corrected, and Rebekka was glad; it made her sister perpetually sweet and youthful. It wasn’t a flaw. It was honest. “I think you’re right, Sis. You might have a problem.”

“If I were more like you, I wouldn’t have this problem.” Eli dabbed a napkin at her eyes. “You said ‘Yes,’ to one guy and knew he was the right one. You never looked back, you didn’t settle, you jumped and landed on your feet.”

“It’s because Michael was the only boy I dated who wasn’t Greek.”

Eli’s shoulders bucked with a half-laugh, “Stop it. Mike is a saint, and he’s utterly beautiful with the kids.” The laugh fought its way to the surface, “Besides, Mama loves him.”

“That’s because Michael told her the only reason he married me was to be closer to her and her kitchen. If he’s not home after work, I have to call Mama and tell her to give him back!”

Eli sniffled, “See? You married a prince.” She breathed in deep and exhaled slowly, “I said ‘Yes’ four times, Bekoula! Four times I looked at a man on bended knee! And each time I gave four ‘No’s before it got to the altar.”

“What about Danny?”

Another wave of slender, manicured fingers from Eli, “Danny has it made. He knows I’m not after a proposal. He knows I can’t walk down the aisle — heck, it was me who said I didn’t even think it necessary to live together. Neither of us married. No kids. It’s uncomplicated. We each have our homes, routines, friends, hobbies and freedoms — of course, we stay over at each other’s often enough, but it feels kind of silly, at this age, to pack and unpack a life — and for what? To look conventional?”

“Is Sebastian flying back to Alaska anytime soon?” Rebekka asked beneath curiously raised eyebrows.

Eli shook her head, “He’s settled in at their family place by the lake. I heard he’s built a log house that comes right out of the mountainside. I’ve heard that it’s gorgeous.”

“Sounds like someone has been listening hard.” Rebekka softened her tone. “Eli, Danny is a good one. You’re good too. You know that, and how are you sure the flowers came from Sebastian?”

“There was a card. It only had three words, ‘Peonies for Paradise,’ that’s it. Not signed or anything.” Eli repeated her sister’s gesture at their surroundings, “Eli — Elysium?”

“That’s really corny,” Rebekka said, “But sort of poignant, forlorn even. All those years, though? He never reached out, sent a message? Nothing? Why?”

“Who knows? Maybe he was married, had a family. Maybe he did creep my Facebook and saw that I always had someone on my arm. I posted my engagements. I don’t know, but I think maybe I was too much.”

Rebekka realized she hadn’t been as good a sister as she should have. She didn’t know any of this. All it would have taken was having a coffee break with Eli once or twice a month. To sit down, talk and really listen. She thought Eli was the lucky one, but now she understood; Eli hadn’t found her home and her heart wanted one. She saw fresh tears fighting their way through Eli’s fluttering eyelids. “Ohhh, Eli.”

Eli shrugged and gave a laugh-cry swallow, “I never really had it, you know? Not all of it. Not like you. I’m not easy, Sis.”

Rebekka leaned forward on steepled hands. It was a fine line between being supportive and suggestive; she liked Danny, but she loved her sister. “Maybe Sebastian has come all the way back, and you’re his paradise?”

A week later, the car crept along the pine needle and leaf-blanketed red clay driveway. Looking as though the log home sprouted from the rock, and with the expansive lake-facing deck floating on high stilts over the steep bank, it was spectacular.

Eli parked and rolled down the window. Busy chipmunks chittered. Birdsong carried on a breeze rich with woodsmoke, fresh pine, and that clean lake shore perfume. After drawing a deep breath and exhaling through pursed lips, she reached over and took the box from the passenger seat, then exited the car and walked to the house.

The door opened as she raised her hand to knock.

“Hi,”

“Welcome back,” Eli replied with a smile. She took the basket of peonies from the box and handed them to Sebastian. “I brought you a housewarming gift. I heard it’s your favourite.”