The Other Sister, page 14
Back in the living room, Marie is still sitting against the wall.
“Hey, look at us.” I gesture at my padded head and her wrapped hand. “Bandage twins.”
“I…” Marie clears her throat, but doesn’t get any further.
Come on, Marie, stay with me. I sit down cross-legged next to her. Yeah, okay, we’re both hurt, but we’ve got to deal with it. This is only the beginning.
“You have to tell me what happened, Geraldine,” she says finally. “You can’t expect me to believe this was some kind of accident.”
There we are. That’s the Marie I know.
“It wasn’t.” I take a deep breath. “I was unloading my car, and this pickup pulled in. These two guys say they’re looking for Plover Beach.” Come on, sell it, Geraldine. Make it real. “I go to show them on the map and one of them grabs my arms, and the other…” I gesture at my face. “I got one good kick to the nuts in, though.”
“Did you call the police?”
“No.”
“What? We have to…” She reaches for her purse.
“You do, and I’ll tell them I tripped and fell down Mom’s gully and hit my face on a rock.”
“They won’t believe you,” she says.
“And there’s jack shit they can do if I won’t swear out a complaint.”
“Why are you doing this, Geraldine?”
I look her right in the eye. At least, I think I do. My vision’s pretty blurry. “Because it’s my choice, and there’s jack shit anybody can do about that, either.”
Silence falls, and I feel the old telepathy surge between us. We are telling each other that the forms are completed and the boxes checked. I have said what I had to, and so has she. We can move on.
I settle back against the wall and dangle my hands over my knees.
“That is some car you’ve got.”
She blinks, and frowns at me. “It was my birthday present from Dad when I turned forty. He wanted me to be safe.”
“So he bought you a tank.”
“You know he has his own way of showing he cares.”
“That’s for sure.”
Her fingers tap at the edges of her own bandage. She hates that thing, too, and wants to rip it off. Her wound was accidental, a sign that she’s not entirely in control. That kind of thing gnaws at her.
“Where are you…Geraldine, you’re not sleeping in your car again, are you?”
“With a perfectly good house here for me?” I answer back, because whole truths are not what the situation calls for. “I’m not that crazy. Come on and see base camp.”
I climb to my feet and hold out my hand. Marie stares at it for a minute. Then, she lays her palm against mine so I can help pull her up, like I used to when we were girls climbing trees.
Let’s not do this, Marie, I think before I can stop myself. Let’s just get out of here. We’ll load all the gear into your car. We’ll take the money. We’ll take everything and we’ll run. I know how to now. I’ll get us some fake IDs. We can leave the country if that’s what you want. I’ve been around the world. I know how to live through a night in a Walmart parking lot or a sandstorm in rural China. I can get along in four languages. We can do it this time. It won’t be like before.
I wish I could say all that, and more. I wish I could make her believe it. But when has that ever worked? So, instead I lead her into our old bedroom so she can see what else I’ve been doing with my morning.
I lined the file boxes up under the window. I turned over a couple of milk crates to make a platform for my desktop computer, and a third to use as a table for the gooseneck lamp. My backpack leans next to the closet, and my few changes of clothes and my spike heel boots are arranged on the shelves. I stretched my pad and sleeping bag out where our bunk beds used to be. Right beside our hiding place of a vent.
But Marie’s not really seeing any of this. Her attention is captured by the photographs I taped to the wall.
They’re all snapshots of me and Marie. We’re little girls throwing autumn leaves at each other. We’re young women at a birthday party for mutual friends. There, Marie is all dolled up in pink with her hair blown out Farrah Fawcett style, ready for the prom. There, I’m in full goth mode for Halloween.
She doesn’t look at the vent. Not once.
I found the note, Marie.
There, we are holding hands over each other’s heads in a triumph that was so long ago and so fleeting I don’t even remember it.
I found your note. You found mine. Marie. Marie…what did you do?
Marie’s eyes slip from one moment to the other in this crooked display of our messy, ordinary lives. I see the doubt in her. Was this really me? Did any of it really happen?
Yes, Marie. This was all real, too. Including your wedding day.
Because Marie’s wedding is here, too. There’s the whole lineup of us girls. I was maid of honor in a Laura Ashley dress. Up until now, it was my longest return performance in Whitestone. I’m practically skeletal and I look like hell in all that pink and green, but I’m smiling for the camera and my sister. There’s no photo of me trying to convince her to leave her fiancé at the altar.
I’m going to say it. I am. I am going to break the silence.
Here are David and Marie together, holding each other’s hands. We spent that entire week maneuvering around each other to try to avoid being alone together in the same room.
In the photo, Marie smiles at him with that look I know so well—the deep, desperate hope that she will be allowed to keep just this one thing.
I’m going to do it now. It’s just five words, after all. Five. Marie, what did you do?
“I’m glad you kept these,” Marie says. “I wasn’t sure you would. Dad didn’t like having them around, especially after the divorce. They didn’t…”
That’s as far as she gets. It’s okay. I know what she means. These photos didn’t fit in the home Dad crafted, so Marie had sent them to me.
Because there’s shots of Mom, too. Here, she’s holding our hands with our toddler selves. There, we’re all in the lake, splashing each other. And there, Marie and I are out front of the store with the banner we painted declaring HAppY SeVenTH ANNIVERSARy STACey B’s! Aunt Florence, Walt’s mom, shades her eyes with her hand and waves. Mom wears red oven mitts and hoists a pie over her head.
Here, she’s hoisting a beer to the camera.
There, it’s a glass of vodka and a cigarette.
In the present, Marie is whispering, almost like she’s trying to explain things to this cluster of long-gone moments. Then, she spots the lone black-and-white photo. I salvaged this all on my own, and when I ran away, I took it with me.
It shows two girls in peg pants and tight sweaters with their arms around each other. They both have the same pale hair and they stand on the terrace in front of the stained-glass forest, framed by the roses. The shorter girl leans her head on her sister’s shoulder.
It’s Mom and Aunt Trish. It’s the only evidence we have that, once upon a time, they really were sisters. And in a kingdom far, far away, those two princesses really did live in a castle on a hill.
Until the king and queen died.
Until the prince came and charmed the younger sister.
Marie touches that old picture gently. The pressure of unspoken words squeezes my eardrums and my bruises. We are both wondering the same thing: Is she going to say it out loud? Will she risk it? Will I?
But then the pressure bursts and Marie turns her back on the photos and their faded memories.
“Geraldine, you can’t stay here. Not after this.” She gestures toward my damaged face and just like that we are back on script.
“I’ll lock the doors,” I promise.
“At least let me call David. He’s working for the security company we use.”
I suck in a deep breath. I keep my voice steady as I answer, but it’s hard, especially with the long-past image of David in that ridiculous tux staring up at me from the wedding photo.
Especially when I’m remembering that other night. The one where I sat on the hood of my car with my knees pulled up to my chest and stared out at the lake, drinking David’s beer and feeling the reality of what I’d done settle in. I tried to send David away from my—our—disaster then. But leaving was never David’s way. Every single other ex–Monroe spouse has, by pure coincidence I’m sure, decided to leave Whitestone Harbor. Most have left Michigan altogether. But not David. Never David.
Treacherous memory flits from David to Tyler. I hang my head, because suddenly my assorted aches are clamping down hard, despite the Tylenol. Old, sick cravings stir in the pit of my brain.
I press my bruise again.
“Okay, Marie. If you insist, I’ll talk with David.”
“I insist. I…there’s something else you need to know.”
“Why doesn’t that surprise me?”
“It’s Carla.”
“Carla? Jesus! I thought…” I stop myself just in time. “What’s happened with Carla?”
Marie takes a deep breath and chooses her words with exquisite care. “Today she told me that Walt thinks he might have found some discrepancies in the billing around the summer houses.”
Might have. Walt thinks. She told me. There are all kinds of demurrals and ways to backtrack in that sentence. Good job, Marie.
“She said she thinks I’m responsible for them.”
The words drop between us, sinking fast into cold silence. But she’s not done.
“Walt knows you’ve threatened Dad with some kind of audit.”
Keep it together, Geraldine. I press my bruise. Pain clears the shock. I suck air. “Yeah, well, I figured Dad would tell him right away. I mean, Walt’s handled the books for how long now?”
Marie refuses to be distracted. “He told Carla because he was worried about…things…he’s found. I told her I’d talk to you. That I would get you to back off for a week or so, so I could get things cleaned up.” She pauses for a very long time. “I said that I needed time to make sure no one would blame Walt for…whatever comes to light.”
Oh, good job, Marie. Really. Because if there’s anybody I give a shit about besides you, it’s Carla. And poor, stupid, goddamned cousin Walt.
But before I can work out how to answer, the sound of tires on gravel rattles through the room. Marie’s head jerks around.
“Who’s that?” Marie is shaking again. Jesus. I’m the ex-junkie, ex-cutter, ex–suicide attempter, but she’s the one who looks like she’s going cold turkey.
“Who do you think?” But even as I say it, fear lances up the familiar straight line from my ankles to my scarred mouth.
“I’m sorry, Geraldine,” Marie whispers. “I’m sorry. I thought I’d be all right. I thought I could do this, but I’m not. I can’t.”
I want to slap her. I want to scream. I want to throw everything into the car and drive away. Change my name. Forget her, forget myself. Swim away into the dark and this time never to come back.
Instead, I face my sister, who is standing in front of the fading evidence of our other lives, and I make myself speak with absolute calm.
“You’ll be fine, Marie. Just as soon as I open the door, you’ll know exactly what you have to do.”
I walk across the threshold and down the hall. I do not look back. Marie has to decide for herself whether she’s going through with this.
Lights. I cross the empty living room to stand at the front door.
Camera. I pull back the door.
Action.
“Hi, Dad. What brings you out this way?”
2.
“I wanted to make sure you were all right,” my father breathes.
I try not to notice how much he looks like Marie right now, down to the way the color drains out of his healthy, tanned cheeks.
“I’m fine. What’s this? Groceries? Aw. You shouldn’t have.” I lift the paper bags out of his arms. I can see a couple of little supermarket deli trays of cheese and sausages, another of cut vegetables. Some boxes of crackers. And a big bottle of rum, and another of Diet Coke.
“Gee. Thanks, Dad.”
I carry both bags into the kitchen to set on the one section of counter that is the only thing still standing. The appliances have all been ripped out, and I do mean all. There’s a hole where the stove used to be, and the cheap green linoleum curls around it.
Another man, seeing his daughter hurt, would insist on taking her to the doctor. He would at least come touch her, make her sit down, try to get the full story. Not my father. He stays right where he is, drinking in every last raggedly little detail of me and my injuries.
Despite all my plans and resolve and bravado, I finding that hard, distant gaze surprisingly hard to take. “Can I get you a…Oh, no, I guess not.” I pull out the two-liter bottle of pop and the massive bottle of white rum. “Wait. I’ve got some glasses in the boxes. Just give me a sec…”
“What are you doing, Geraldine?” snaps Dad. Oh, I’ve managed to rattle him good.
“Just trying to remember my manners.” My palms are sweating. Jesus. I wipe my hands on my jeans. “You’re my guest.”
“Dad?” Marie’s voice startles me. I didn’t hear her come out of the bedroom. “I didn’t expect you to be here.”
Marie ghosts past me to our father’s side, close enough that I feel the brush of her warmth against my hand. As a piece of choreography, it’s exactly what the moment calls for. Also, it puts her just out of Dad’s line of sight. This is no accident.
“What happened here?” Dad asks her.
“It’s nothing, Dad,” she answers, too quickly. “An accident.”
“She told you that?”
“Leave Marie alone,” I snap. “If you’ve got questions, ask me.”
“I’ve tried that. It never goes very well, does it?” Oh, all that sick, sad, eternal patience in his eyes. People call them bottomless. That’s just another word for empty.
Empty, and yet his gaze still penetrates all the way to the bone.
Over my dad’s shoulder, Marie’s mouth moves. She shapes one word. I see it, her, from the very corner of my vision.
Now, says my sister. Now.
Action.
“Not that you should have a whole lot of real questions anyway. You already know how this happened.” I tap my bruised temple.
Anger burns deep behind my father’s smug, perfect eyes, and I enjoy it. Oh, this is bad. I cannot let emotion wash me away. Not now. But I’ve been waiting so long to break open this man’s armor of money, pride, and family. I want to pry him out and leave him naked on the ground in the cold, in the snow, in the dark.
I smell tobacco. I smell beer. The reek of memory and home and the mother I could not save. I smile and it hurts.
“Was there something you wanted, Dad?” I ask. “Because I was planning on heading out for the graveyard. I want to take Aunt Trish some flowers. Maybe toss a few over the cliff for Uncle Pete on the way.”
“Geraldine,” Marie prompts. It sounds like a warning. But she already gave me the go-ahead, and I am going to follow through.
Now.
“So that’s what this is about.” Our father gathers himself fully back into his Martin Monroe armor. “You came back to accuse me of murder. Again.”
3.
Murder. Again.
The words ring through the room, bringing the past down over me like a bell jar, sealing me off from sense and reason.
I am thirteen, with clenched fists and obscenity dripping from my angry tongue. Mom is huddled on the sofa, her head in both hands, sobbing. It’s the first time I’ve seen her cry for nothing but sheer sorrow. I’m responsible for her. I have to make sure she doesn’t get hurt or go off drinking again. And there’s Dad, making everything worse, telling her everything she’s done wrong, every way she’s screwed up and disappointed everybody. But this time it’s different. This is the time I realize that he’s doing it on purpose. That it is always on purpose.
In the present, he says, “You know how Pete died, Geraldine. And so did your aunt, and so did your mother.”
“Oh, yes,” I tell him. “They knew. Isn’t it funny how I’m the only one who left town and the only one who survived?”
“Pete came to me for money to leave town,” says Dad calmly. “I gave it to him, but in the end, he couldn’t stand the shame.”
“Yes. I remember what you told us.” I make sure he’s looking me full in my wounded face as I speak. I want to make sure he picks up on all the little nuances here. “I also remember you had your hands bandaged pretty good for a week there, afterward. Like you’d cut up your knuckles.”
I am fifteen, spitting blood and swinging out so he cannot grab me and take me away with him. It doesn’t matter how hard I snarl, or bite, or claw. I can’t get away. He ignores my blood and my screams and bears me down to the icy bricks.
Why? I scream. What do you even care? You don’t want me! You never wanted me!
Because you’re mine, Geraldine, and you always will be, he whispers in my ear. I do not give up on what is mine.
“I know why you did it, too.”
Marie doesn’t move. Marie doesn’t matter. This is between me and him. Dad steps forward until his shadow slides across me. He’s still a tall man. Still a powerful man. I’m already shrunken and hurting.
“You thought Mom was having an affair with Uncle Pete. You were sure she betrayed you by screwing your loser of a brother. But that wasn’t what they were doing,” I go on, forcing my voice to carry beyond the depths of memory. “At least not by then. You got it wrong, Dad.”
I am seventeen. My stitched and stapled ankles throb beneath their bandages. I’m staring, stupefied while my father describes in loving detail how my mother’s body was found. How she was bruised and broken, and dead. I’m euphoric because I’m free of her. I’m horrified, because of what I’ve done. I’m lost, and this time I know I’m never going to be found. Because with every glance, and every sad word, my father is telling me he knows what I did, and that he is going to forgive me. And I want him to. I want it so bad I can taste it.
She’s your responsibility now.
