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typical day, even when it was just the two of them. Emmy had set the small kitchen table with a pretty cloth and had buttered the last of the week’s bread for her father to sop up the gravy. Karin wouldn’t be home from prayer circle for another hour, and Birdie was listening to Gunsmoke on the radio in the other room. This was Emmy’s moment. As her head began to buzz, she sat down across from her father and noted how small his blue eyes were set above his graying stubble. He was getting old, she couldn’t deny it—at least forty, probably older. The girls’ birthdays were marked without fanfare, and Emmy had no idea when her father was born. Reaching out to touch his hand, she tried to summon her will to ask permission for the movie, but a lump took over her throat and she tapped his knuckles lightly instead. He turned his hand over and caught hers before she could slip it away.
    “Why don’t you ever want anything?” he asked. Emmy stood and glanced through the open doorway at her sister, who seemingly hadn’t heard Christian’s question.
    “I do,” Emmy said, bringing Christian’s warm plate of food to the table and sitting back down. She hadn’t known she was allowed to want something, and his simple query sent her thoughts flying through a list of stanched desires, rolling up to the edge of wanting one thing very badly: to go to that movie.
    “You’re eighteen now, Emmy,” he replied without picking up his fork. “Your mother’s kept a tight rein on you, and I reckon that’s all right.” He paused and Emmy waited as he stared at her, hard. “You need to speak your mind.”
    Emmy cleared her throat, but a small gurgle came out when she tried to speak. She cleared it again. “Well, my friend, Bev Langer, is going to a movie tomorrow night— The Ten Commandments, the one with Charlton Heston?” she began, then stalled. He nodded for her to continue, so she took a deeper breath. “I was wondering if maybe … I could go with?” She exhaled. Picked at a stain on the tablecloth, making a mental note to rub some baking soda into it before washing it in the morning.
    Christian smiled slightly and continued eating. Emmy wondered what he might be thinking, if he was trying to come up with a way to square it with Karin, whether he’d wait the half hour until she came home to give an answer. Emmy forced herself to not look at either the clock or her Bulova, playing instead with the stretchy metal band as it pinched at the skin on her wrist. She focused all her energy on keeping her eyes on her father. She knew that if he looked up and met her gaze he would never say no.
    “I’d be back right after the movie,” Emmy offered, not sure how to read her father’s silence. “I can get all the chores done, I’ll get up extra early, and I can teach Birdie to help bake the bread.”
    “Movies cost money, Emmy,” Christian replied without looking up.
    “Bev said it would be her treat, for my birthday. Oh, please, can I go, please?” She sprang up from the table and went to the icebox to get a bottle of milk. Her birthday had just passed and, as usual, they had done nothing to mark it. Mentioning it to her father made her feel ungrateful, and her hand shook a little as she carefully poured half a glass, keeping the rest for the morning’s porridge. The price of milk had recently dropped and they needed to sell most of the farm’s production to keep things going. There was a time when they’d had so much fresh milk that Emmy couldn’t stand the sight of it, particularly the thick layer of cream that would float on the top of the pitcher and would have to be either scooped off or pierced to release the milk below. Now that it was dear, she licked her lips at the thought of the small glassful that she set in front of Christian. She hovered over his right shoulder, swaying with the keen excitement of having asked for something, feeling as though she didn’t deserve it. She shifted from foot to foot.