Sisters One, Two, Three Quotes

“It was odd how often this happened, Ginger and Mimi retaining different slivers of family memory. It was almost as if the recollections had been split down the middle and doled out: you get this, I get that, so no one would be privy to it all. Ginger glanced over and saw Callie washing her mug with great purpose.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“At Glory’s house, she went inside to check on the progress of the painter. That was the division of labor: Ginger oversaw and Mimi paid. The kitchen, walls a clean creamy white, smelled of paint, but the painter was gone. No more work would be done in Glory’s house today. She caught herself. This was not Glory’s house anymore. That head-banging discovery came the day after Glory’s move into the Meadows, when Ginger, attending to the mountain of her mother’s past-due bills, came upon a statement for a reverse mortgage that neither sister knew anything about. She’d immediately called Mimi and shared the news that without consulting them, Glory had taken out a reverse mortgage, ten years ago, with the lump-sum option.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“This was how she got through her life. She did what was required. What was required here? Stand up. Open the closet. Take out the clothes. Put them in a bag. What did she require? Don’t think.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“Back behind the wheel, it didn’t take long for her thoughts to turn to Callie, but every time she tried to picture her youngest sister, she came up blank. Glory’s prohibition against photographs had done its work. Her mother’s reasons changed depending on her mood. Sometimes it was, They’re just dust magnets. Other times it was, I prefer to start every day fresh. But now, with Julia gone, Ginger finally understood it. Her mother had banned photographs because the captured memories were painful to see”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“Other nights, when she woke anxious, she’d follow the cursor to Middle Street, to the squat red bricks of the Portland Police Headquarters or to the courthouse, where she’d examine the building so closely she could make out which windows had air-conditioner units and which units were reinforced with plywood planks. She’d check the online news after that to learn in real time about car accidents, assaults, and fires. Google Earth would then take her there, to the very spot where the incident occurred, so she could search, block by block, irrationally—these weren’t webcams—for signs of Julia or Nick or their no-air-bag car.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“Ginger was well aware of the difference between how she was perceived at school and how she felt at home. At school she was a reliable, efficient, clear-headed thinker. At home, she felt like a poster child for the derailed. In the past, she’d tried to apply her no-nonsense nurseness to her off-duty home life, but she never managed to make it work. This was how it would go: a boy at school would complain that he had to keep clearing his throat, and she’d confidently reassure him it was probably just a cold. If the problem persisted, she would call home and suggest the mother take him to an allergist. But if Julia complained of the same postnasal drip, instead of thinking allergist, Ginger would suddenly remember the mother she met at Field Day whose brain tumor had presented with exactly that symptom.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“As usual, Ginger got the booby prize, front seat, and as usual, Glory drove like she was an actress sitting in the chopped-off half of a fake car on an old-time movie set, images of the world whizzing by as if on a screen. It was all, look over there, as the car swerved to the right, and look at that, as she overcorrected to the left. Anyone watching would surely assume they were a carload of drunken teenagers, and not a family with a mother who drove, forearms pressed against the wheel, as she inexplicably applied and then reapplied her lipstick every five minutes. Really, it was a mystery, how the same woman who could sit perfectly still, studying a single puzzle piece for minutes at a time, had to fidget constantly while driving.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“Ginger pulled the drape cord and, like Carol Merrill on Let’s Make a Deal, revealed picture windows and a sliding door. Also revealed, outside, was Charlie digging a hole with his hands, Mimi raining dirt over his head, and Callie twirling as fast as she could. Ginger struggled to pull the drapes closed, but the cord was stuck. Mimi saw her and though no sound permeated the glass, Ginger could see her scream a warning. One more tug and the drapes closed. Ginger swung around, ready to defend her ill-behaved siblings, but Glory had seen none of it.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“Her daughter looked like a marionette on break. Ginger took a breath and reminded herself that there were scientific studies showing people in comas could hear what was being said around them. Surely if a coma victim could hear, so could an oppositional teenager.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“When it was her turn to order, she asked for coffee with room for milk. Her generous interpretation of why Nick overfilled her cup so much that black liquid sloshed on the counter? The place was noisy and the boy couldn’t hear. The time it took for Ginger to figure out what Nick meant, in dollars, when he rang her up and said, “That will be three hundred and fourteen cents”? Just under a minute. Duration of Nick’s independent-coffee-shop job? Four days. Reason for termination, according to Julia? Owner had no sense of humor.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“Of course, Mimi would deny it. She was, or pretended to be, unaware of the benefit the chaos of the Popkin clan afforded her. Instead, she complained about how her house was always overfull, and given the size of her house, this was no small feat. Richard referred to the place as the Clue House, because it boasted a study, a library, and a billiard room. There was also a solarium, a media room, a dedicated closet for Neil’s fly-fishing equipment, and a carriage house out back, which Mimi was currently using as a studio, now that she was an artist. Quilts were her current thing. Before she started quilting, she’d been a real estate agent. Prior to that she owned a children’s furniture store. She’d also sold organic cosmetics and ran a small food cooperative.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“Ginger Tangle had nothing against nature. She often stopped to notice the sky, clouds particularly, but also hawks circling and the dissipating puffy trails of planes. But today was different. Today, in the parking lot at the summit of Mount Washington, as she gazed at the granite ledges perched over sheer drops only inches from where her disgruntled teenage daughter stood, what she felt was hypertension. She could hear it, her heartbeat pulsing in her ears.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“raincoat”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“It was odd how often this happened, Ginger and Mimi retaining different slivers of family memory. It was almost as if the recollections had been split down the middle and doled out: you get this, I get that, so no one would be privy to it all.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“You know, everything is going along fine, it’s just another story, you’re barely paying attention, and all of a sudden the story changes course and you’re sitting there thinking, wait a minute. That didn’t happen. But of course, you can’t say that. You can never, ever say that. If you did, when you do, they just look at you like, what’s wrong with you. Like you’re the crazy one. You’re the one who’s out of your mind. You know what I mean?”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“absolutely did not. “Door stays open,” she”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“This thing she did, her empathy and concern, turned out to have the unfortunate consequence of driving people away.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“after all”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“interruption or a keep-behind-a-closed-door”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“Overcooked asparagus dripped off the rim of a platter like clocks in a Dalí painting. And”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“temporary.” She got quiet and Ginger didn’t ask any questions. But even if Thomas hadn’t gone to stay with his father, Ginger soon realized she wouldn’t have been allowed to work for Evelyn. It would have been too upsetting for Glory. That was the main thing now: making sure Glory didn’t get more upset. With their return to New Jersey, her headaches had come back. She had one every day, incapacitating migraines that sometimes were so bad, Ginger could hear moaning from all the way downstairs. The only thing that brought relief was being alone, staying in bed, and switching up washcloths—a cool one on her forehead while a backup soaked in the bowl of ice water that took up permanent residence on her night table. Ginger was sure the headaches were, at least in part, because of her. She wasn’t sure exactly what her role was in the accident, but she knew accusations would be coming before long. Any minute now, they’d begin. That they hadn’t started yet was confusing. Every morning she braced herself for the blowup. But her mother did not emerge”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“her mother. “It’s too windy.” The umbrella”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three

“Sometimes I meet someone, he rubs me the wrong way. Your mother meets the same person, she thinks he’s peachy keen.”
― Nancy Star, Sisters One, Two, Three