The Orchid Sister

by LeClaire, Anne D.

  Maddie heard the sharp clicking of heels in the background and a woman’s voice but could not distinguish what his wife—or whoever she was—was saying. “But she hasn’t been answering her phone or returning the messages I’ve left. Don’t you think that’s odd?”

  “I think just about everything that sister of yours does is odd.”

  Maddie bit back a retort. Jesus, did he think she’d be calling him if she had anyone else to call? “I’m really worried, Carl. I was wondering . . .”

  “Wondering what?”

  “Well, if you would drive into the city and check. Just check and see that she’s okay, that she hasn’t had an accident or something.” She doubted he would agree to this, but she had to try, had to convey her worries. The image of Kat unconscious in the bathtub flitted across her vision.

  Again, the barking laugh. “I’ll tell you something, kid. I wouldn’t cross the fucking street for your precious sister. You want someone to check on her, you’d better call the cops.”

  “She could be hurt. Or worse.”

  “Hey, if my luck was that good, I’d be playing the lottery,” he said, his voice thick with indifference.

  He hung up before Maddie could reply. She felt adrift. Maybe phoning the Georgetown police made sense. Or she could go check herself. Do what she had just asked Carl to do. She glanced at the clock, saw it was quarter to one. If she left now, she could be in Washington by eight. Nine, if she hit traffic going through New York. It would be better than waiting, pacing, worrying, imagining.

  Waging hope against a sense of futility, she again tried Kat’s numbers, tried not to hear an ominous tone in every unanswered ring. No better luck with a call to Izzy. She finished the coffee and rinsed out the mug. She knew she would continue to worry and would be unable to work until she did something. She opened the file drawer in her desk. As the executors of each other’s estates, she and Kat had traded envelopes holding details of their lives. Kat’s had been thicker. It held a computer printout listing the names of Kat’s insurance company and the bank where she held accounts, a copy of her will, a list of her internet passwords, and a key to her house. Maddie took the key. She did the breathing thing she’d learned to do to avert an attack, but her skin felt too tight, her pulse raced. It took no more than fifteen minutes to pack a few things and fill two bowls of kibble for Winks. She was in the car when she remembered she hadn’t changed his litter box and went back in to do that. She thought about calling Lonnie, but, still miffed from their last conversation, she didn’t.

  There was a multicar accident on I-95 in Connecticut. Staring at the flashing lights ahead on the highway, it hit her that if she hadn’t gone back to tend to the litter box, she very well might have been in the accident, and she thought about Lonnie’s comments about chance. Capricious chance. More flashing lights swooped by. Tow trucks and an ambulance. An hour later she was again on her way. A pit stop for gas and a bathroom break added more time to the trip. By the time she turned onto P Street, it was close to midnight. The pavement was wet from an earlier shower. It took her another ten minutes before she found a parking spot two blocks from Kat’s house. She’d worn Reeboks and her feet were quiet on the deserted sidewalk, but, spooked, she couldn’t resist looking over her shoulder. By the last half block, she was close to jogging.

  The Georgian row house had been Carl’s base when he worked in the capital for any stretch of time, and after the divorce it was the only thing Kat walked away with. At the time, Kat had told Maddie that she’d heard rumors that Carl had used the place to entertain women—DC hangers-on, reporters, secretaries—and she hadn’t wanted it. Even if the rumors were unfounded, the house held sour memories. But Kat had said that to fight Carl on the prenup would have cost far more than she would have gained. So he got the house in Maryland and she kept the Georgetown property. Not a bad trade-off, Kat had said. Five years in a marriage wrong from the get-go in exchange for her freedom and the row house. She spent almost a year renovating it and redecorating it, erasing every trace of Carl.

  Maddie rang the bell, heard its faint chime through the door, and waited, hoping against reason that her sister would answer. Her hand shook as she reached for the rail to steady herself, and she tried to prepare herself for what she might find inside. Finally, she took the key from her bag and unlocked the door. The air inside was stale, the silence total.

  “Kat?” Her voice echoed, and she shivered against the sudden chill that touched her spine in spite of the May heat. She flicked on the wall switch, and light flooded the entry hall and living room. The furniture—upholstered in a cream and forest-green print fabric—had been rearranged since her last visit. It was as perfect as a stage set. “Kat?”

  The dining alcove angled off to the left. She switched on the chandelier, an antique of crystal that Kat had discovered in the back room of a shop in Alexandria. Soft lighting lit the long glass-topped table, the wrought-iron wine stand, and the Duncan Phyfe sideboard that had belonged to their parents. It held a collection of jewel-toned goblets. A bay window looked out over P Street. Three orchids filled the wide windowsill, cutting off the view from the bottom half of the mullioned panes. Their outer leaves were yellow and curled; petals as dry as tissue paper littered the sill and floor. Another tongue of ice ran the length of her back. Kat pampered these plants, coddled them, even named them, as if they were the children or pets she never had. She headed into the kitchen.

  Clutter greeted her, so uncommon for Kat, who demanded order. Fast-food containers were on the café table. Dirty dishes—a mug, small china bowl, two tumblers—sat in the sink. The trash container was partially filled. Maddie smelled the rankness of something organic gone bad. Her breath quickened, and the raspiness of it echoed in the empty house.

  She stiffened her shoulders and headed for the bedroom. The room was vacant and she exhaled in relief. If something had happened to Kat, it hadn’t happened there. Still, she couldn’t shake off a mounting apprehension. The bed had been carelessly made. She forced herself to look at the sheets and pillow slips. No stains. No blood. Still, her hands trembled, her heart raced.

  She continued to the bathroom, bracing herself for what lay beyond the closed door. She twisted the knob, half expecting resistance from Kat’s body crumpled on the floor, but the door swung open. A towel was draped over the side of the tub. The vanity was covered with cosmetic jars and a wicker basket that held an assortment of lipstick tubes and mascara wands. There was a hair dryer, still plugged into the outlet, and four brushes and various bottles containing vitamins. Maddie held each item, as if examining for clues. She picked the bottles up, read the labels. A, E, C, D, and B complex capsules in addition to a multivitamin pill and an iron tablet. This struck Maddie as extreme overkill, but then she didn’t even take C to ward off colds. She picked up one of the brushes. The rounded bristle end struck her as impossibly fat. She drew a long ash-colored hair from it. What could she possibly learn from that?

  A pair of Kat’s panties lay on the floor by the shower. They were a pale green, bikini-style, with the crotch exposed, as if Kat had just moments before stepped out of them. A white terry-cloth garment hung from the hook on the back of the door, the kind of lush robe that high-class hotels provided for guests. Three words were embroidered in blue floss on the breast pocket: RETIRADA DE LA PLAYA. Although Kat spoke the language fluently, Maddie’s high school Spanish, never great to begin with, was beyond rusty. She considered possible translations. Refuge by the shore? Retirement by the shore? Something like that, anyway. A souvenir from some trip, she supposed. Mexico? Spain? She checked the deep side pockets and the smaller one with the blue stitching but found nothing. Not even a tissue. She left the bathroom and returned to Kat’s bedroom.

  The answering machine was on the bedside table. She punched the button and listened to her own voice relay the messages she had left over the past few days. A woman named Lucille had called four times, a man with a liquid voice and southern accent had left two brief “call m
e” messages but no name, a half dozen robo calls. There were a number of hang-ups.

  A pair of thin cotton gloves lay next to the machine. Maddie picked them up, laid them against her cheek. The familiar sweetness of Kat’s almond-oil cream filled her nostrils. As long as she could remember, her sister had slept wearing gloves like these to pamper her hands and nails. She held them for several minutes, breathing in the scent, and then returned them to the table.

  Back in the kitchen, she opened the refrigerator and surveyed the few staples. A pint of half-and-half gone sour, a jar of capers, another of tiny cocktail onions, a tin of coffee, a container of moldy lo mein, a baggie with four bagels inside. In the freezer compartment she found a pint of sour cherry low-fat ice cream, two ice trays, and an unopened bottle of Absolut. The door that led to the rear courtyard was bolted shut.

  The small room Kat used as her combo office, gym, and—for Maddie’s occasional visits—spare bedroom was neater than Kat’s room or the kitchen. Circling the rowing machine and two sets of dumbbells, Maddie crossed to the two-drawer file. The top one held folders, and she took out the first one. Notes and research for articles her sister had written. The other files held more of the same. The bottom drawer was empty.

  A combination printer/fax/copier sat on top of the cabinet. The internet modem was on the floor by the desk. Kat’s laptop was gone, its absence briefly reassuring. If Kat was off on an assignment, she would have taken it with her. Maddie could find nothing unusual. There was the normal paraphernalia of a home office. Reams of paper, a mug containing an array of pencils and pens, a coaster for the mug of coffee Kat always drank when she was working on a story. A three-shelf bookcase held several atlases, The Chicago Manual of Style, a variety of books, both fiction and biographies. The bottom shelf held stacks of magazines that Kat had written for, most of them from the periodical where she had been on staff until it went defunct. On top of the bookcase were framed photos of Kat with various people, some of whom Maddie recognized as the subjects of profiles she had written. In the back, partially obscured by a photo of Kat with the artistic director of Lincoln Center, was a small snapshot of Maddie. It had been taken when she was a sophomore in college and had spent spring break with Kat. She was sitting on a bench by the pool in front of the Jefferson Memorial. The cherry trees were in bloom. That was the last photo Maddie remembered Kat taking of her. Before the accident.

  She went back to the kitchen and shot the deadbolt open, stepped into the brick courtyard edged with boxwood. A circular wrought-iron table and four chairs occupied the center. These had been painted with a dark green enamel, and spots of rust were visible on the arms of two of the chairs. A small border of thirsty-looking herbs lined the back side of the kitchen wall. Even in the moonlight, Maddie recognized sage, tarragon, and rosemary. Rosemary for remembrance. In the kitchen, she filled the tumbler that she’d seen in the sink and carried it out to the courtyard. It took ten trips before she was satisfied that the herbs were resuscitated.

  She should call the police. But say what? She was exhausted, beyond exhausted, and unable to deal with even the thought of dealing with the inevitable questions. She would need to be alert. Another few hours wouldn’t matter now. And what could they really do in the middle of the night? She went through the house, turning off the lights she had switched on. Then she stripped to her underwear and crawled into Kat’s bed. The sheets were silky. Kat loved luxury. A single sheet probably cost more than Maddie spent in years for one set. Before she turned off the lamp next to the bed, she got back up and rechecked the bolts on the front door and the one in the kitchen. On the way back to bed, she turned on a small lamp in the hall, a circle of light to dispel the dark.

  She watched the clock tick off the minutes. It was well after two. When she was a girl and couldn’t sleep because she was afraid of nightmares, she would get up and go into Kat’s room and get into the bed. Her sister wouldn’t say anything, just move over to make room for her. She would stroke Maddie’s hair back from her face. The memory was so vivid, so strong. Longing for the comfort only Kat could bring her, she reached for the cotton gloves, held them to her cheek, again inhaling the almond scent. At last she drifted off. Despite her anxiety and worry, she fell into a sound sleep, the first time she’d slept so deeply since Jack had left.

  MADISON

  The dream was an old one. Maddie moaned in her sleep while it played on, unfolding to its own ordained conclusion. Her father is at the controls, her mother in the copilot’s seat. She is in the back. The sun is bouncing off the nose of the Piper, so bright it hurts her eyes. Her father glances back over his shoulder at her, but his face is distorted: not her father but someone else at the wheel, a stranger who means to do her harm.

  Maddie woke trembling from the dream’s insistent realism. She closed her eyes, forced her mind to the present. She was in Kat’s bedroom in Georgetown. Safe in Kat’s bed. But the return of the dream—it had been years since it had troubled her—disturbed her. Her body felt bloated with memory, each treacherous cell bent on recalling what she had been determined to shut out. A therapist she had seen briefly in the hospital had told her that coming to terms with memory was a way of making sense of the present, a concept she thought inane.

  “I don’t remember,” she told the therapist. This was not entirely true. She did remember some of the crash. And her father’s voice above the crackle of flames. Get out, pumpkin. Get out and run. But perhaps that wasn’t even a real memory. Perhaps she had made it up. She had been told that her parents had died on impact.

  She felt edgy, her heart rate irregular, signs of an impending anxiety attack. She knew she would get no more sleep. She forced herself to take deep breaths. It had been weeks since she’d had an attack, and she had left her meds at home. The bedside clock read five fifteen. She found Kat’s glove twisted in the sheets and brought it to her face. Now the scent of almonds was no longer comforting. It seemed too sweet. She got up, shook off a momentary nausea, headed for the kitchen. Being active, moving, often helped derail an attack before it switched into high gear.

  She brewed coffee. The bagels were stale—more wood than dough—but she managed to get half of one down, which helped the nausea while she worked on a plan. She rehearsed what she would tell the police, trying to strike the right note: concern but not hysteria. She forced herself to wait until it was after eight before she placed the call, filling the hours between with searching her sister’s rooms again, but she uncovered nothing new.

  The dispatcher took her information and told her a patrolman would be there within an hour. While she was waiting, she found a watering can, a graceful copper vessel with a long, curved spout. At home, Maddie used a plastic milk jug to water her houseplants, but Kat wouldn’t think of using something like that. The copper can held less water than it would appear, and it took several trips to again water the herbs on the back patio and the orchids in the dining room. She swept up the desiccated blossoms on the floor.

  They would want a photo of Kat, she supposed. Wasn’t that what the police asked for in missing persons cases? The implication of this chilled her. She took a framed shot from the top of the office bookcase, a photo of her sister with a famous violinist whose name she could not recall. And clothes: they would want to know what she might be wearing. She froze, paralyzed by the unreality of the situation, then went to the closet. She couldn’t conceive of owning so many clothes. Shoeboxes covered the entirety of the floor. She fingered through several hangers before she gave up. There wasn’t a chance in a trillion she would know what was missing.

  She was in the bathroom when the doorbell rang. Before she answered it, she picked up Kat’s panties off the floor and dropped them in the hamper.

  “Ms. DiMarco?”

  The patrolman was in his fifties with a deeply lined face and gray hair that spoke of long experience. She felt hopeful.

  “Ms. DiMarco?” he repeated.

  She nodded.

  “I’m Officer Segerman. The st
ation sent me over.” His eyes widened as he took in her scars, a look she’d grown used to, and then an expression of professional detachment slid into place. “You reported a missing person?”

  “Yes.” She identified herself as Kat’s sister and told him about Kat’s disappearance. He took down Kat’s specifics. Her full name, age, physical appearance, marital status, the last time Maddie had had contact with her. Then he snapped his notebook shut.

  “Do you mind if I take a look around?”

  “No. Of course not.” She followed him as he checked each room, went to the back patio.

  “And you arrived this morning?”

  “Last night. I drove down from Massachusetts.”

  “And this is how you found the place?”

  “Yes. I slept in the bed last night and made coffee this morning.” She didn’t think it important to mention the bagel.

  He made a note in his book. “And that’s all.”

  “Oh, I played the messages on her machine when I first got here.”

  “What time was that?”

  “Around midnight.”

  “Where’s the phone?”

  “There are two. One in the bedroom and an extension in the office. I played the messages on the one in the bedroom.” She waited while he listened to the messages. He had dandruff on the shoulders of his uniform.

  “Do you know who Lucille is?”

  “No.”

  “What about the male? Did you recognize his voice?”

  “No.”

  “Does your sister live alone here?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you said she was divorced?”

  “Yes. About fourteen years ago.” She heard her voice, surprised at how calm and steady it was as she answered his questions, revealing no sign of her inner fears. “I called Carl yesterday, before I drove down, but he hadn’t heard from her. I don’t think they stay in touch. He’s remarried.”