“Doggy kiss!” Daisy said.

Amy turned bewildered blue eyes to me.

“John gave us a dog for Christmas,” I explained. “Lady.”

“Puppy,” DJ said.

I smiled. “Not exactly a puppy. She’s a golden-collie mix.”

“She sounds beautiful,” Amy said.

“And smart,” Jo said from her perch on the windowsill. “Which is more important.”

“The vet thinks she’s about four years old. I figured an adult dog would be less trouble for Meg,” John said.

Jo snorted. “Yeah, because it’s so much easier to scoop the poops of an animal the size of a small pony.”

I coughed to cover my laugh. “I’ll have lots of help.”

“Where did you find her?” Beth asked, beaming approval as John told the story.

Our mother smiled. “Rescuing the homeless.”

“Not exactly,” our father said dryly from the recliner.

Presents heaped the hospital tray and the foot of the bed. I’d bought our joint gift to Momma, a silk scarf she’d admire and tuck away as too good for everyday wear. Jo had picked out Dad’s present, a gloomy-looking book called Aftermath about the war in Iraq. We exchanged our gifts to one another in order of age: scented soaps from me, notebooks with funny sayings from Jo, fuzzy socks from Beth.

Amy’s gifts were different. She’d made them herself, with unerring taste and her almost desperate desire to please, stitched from leather and canvas with bright colors and bold graphics. A folder for Beth’s music with a cubist guitar. A scribbling rat on a padded laptop case for Jo. A square-patterned tote that didn’t look anything like a diaper bag for me.

“These are beautiful, Amy,” our mother said, stroking the stitching on my bag. “You’ve learned so much in Paris.”

“It’s good to see you use your talent for others,” our father said. Even compliments were teaching moments for Dad.

Jo regarded her present, a funny expression on her face.

“I’m sorry I puked on your laptop,” Amy said.

Oh no.

Beth’s eyes widened in sympathy. “She threw up on your laptop?”

“It’s fine,” Jo said.

“It was an accident,” Amy said.

Jo wrapped her ponytail around her hand, securing it in a bun with one vicious stab. “There are no accidents, according to Freud.”

“Picasso,” Amy said in a small voice.

“What?”

“Freud didn’t say that. It was Picasso.”

I hid a smile. Jo sometimes forgot our baby sister was an artist, as ambitious, as talented in her own way as Jo. Amy disguised her determination beneath a bright, shallow surface, but the two were more alike than either wanted to admit.

“Ash, will you read to us now?” our mother suggested. Smoothing things over, the way she did. The way I did. “Before Beth has to leave for the airport.”

Every year that he was home, as far back as I could remember, our father read the Christmas gospel to us in his deep, beautiful preacher’s voice. The memories washed over me as he told the old, familiar story. The hospital noises faded away, squeaking shoes, beeping monitors, the jabber of the TV in the next room. Jo and Beth stood by the window, their arms around each other. I looked from our mother’s serene face to John cradling Daisy to the fluorescent light gleaming on our son’s head, resting on Amy’s shoulder. I was surrounded by love, a lovely pull at my heart, a tug in my womb.