SUNDAY HOSTAGES: A Tale of Love and Loss, Dreams and Reality

The apartment door closed behind them with a thud. Floss tugged at the elastic band on her sailor hat. Estelle gave a hitch to her garter belt and took her sister’s hand. “Come on, Flossie. Daddy’s waiting. Hold tight to the bannister.”They walked slowly down the stairs, two hostages crossing the no man’s land between their mother’s world and their father’s. Floss was five years old. Her hair was still baby-blond and her cheeks were as round and smooth as apples. Estelle had just turned nine. Small for her age, skinny, knobby-kneed, wary, she sighed as she pushed the street door open, thinking of the long day ahead of her.Their father didn’t smile at them. His handsome face under the pearl gray fedora seemed always to be scowling. Estelle read his expression as disapproval, unable to imagine that this weekly ritual could be humiliating for him, too