Three years after my birth, my mother swells again. When Lanka is born and brought home, Shiva and I gaze over the edge of the bassinet at this strange, alien creature and claim her as our own. We are a threesome from then on. Joined at the hip. A pyramid. A triangle.

A sister is a little bit of childhood that can never be lost.

Polly had arrived in the world outraged to discover that her sisters had gotten there before her.

I was surrounded by sisters. My childhood was all women.

. . . because we cannot conceive that as we grow up our own minds will become so enlarged and elevated that we ourselves shall then regard as trifling those objects and pursuits we now so fondly cherish, and that, though our companions will no longer join us in those childish pastimes, they will drink with us at other fountains of delight, and mingle their souls with ours in higher aims and nobler occupations beyond our present comprehension, but not less deeply relished or less truly good for that, while yet both we and they remain essentially the same individuals as before.

This is the only way to mourn their deaths. Our childhood friends are there. Our blood relations are there. But we can't visit each other even at the time of grief.