...of unexpected guests

Frankie sat on the bottom step of the stairs to her room, staring into the kitchen. But although it gave her a kind of pain, she had to think about the wedding. She remembered the way her brother and the bride had looked when she walked into the living-room, that morning at eleven o'clock. There had been in the house a sudden silence, for Jarvis had turned off the radio when they came in; after the long summer, when the radio had gone on day and night, so that no one heard it any more, the curious silence had startled Frankie. She stood in the door-way, coming from the hall, and the first sight of her brother and the bride had shocked her heart. Together they made in her this feeling that she could not name. But it was like the feeling of the spring, only more sudden and more sharp. There was the same tightness and in the same queer way she was afraid. Frankie thought until her mind was dizzy and her foot had gone to sleep.

[The Member Of The Wedding, McCullers, C.]