Paper Hearts

by Ali Novak

  “Oh, I don’t know.” His tone was hardened by sarcasm. “Probably because Rose Lyon and Lizzie O’Brien aren’t the same name.”

  Alec cast a worried glance in my direction. “O’Brien?”

  “It’s my mom’s maiden name,” I explained. “I’ve tried to find Rose online before, and now it makes sense why I never could.”

  “As much as I’ve enjoyed this impromptu interrogation, I’d really like to get back to my comic.” Steven speared Asha with a glare. “Lizzie or whatever her name is got back from work an hour ago. If I let you upstairs, would you leave me alone?”

  Holy shit.

  Rose was here.

  Rose was here right now.

  I gripped the counter for support and took a steadying breath. “Yes,” I exclaimed. “Please.”

  Chapter 17

  Steven led us through the gallery and out the back of the building into the sun. He stopped in front of another door and flipped through the collection of keys. I clasped and unclasped my hands as he found the one he needed and let us in.

  Without another word, he disappeared back inside the shop.

  “They really need to work on their customer service here,” Boomer muttered, but I was only half listening.

  A staircase stretched out in front of me.

  The last forty-eight hours had passed in a whirlwind since I found my sister’s letters. I’d wanted to track down Rose so badly that I took off without giving myself a chance to consider how reading her words made me feel. And now that I was on the verge of seeing her, I was filled with anger. I was mad at her for leaving, for all the years of not knowing if she was okay. Mad at her for not coming back. It was the kind of long-lasting anger that simmered under the skin, unnoticed for long stretches of time until something like a song, a snippet of conversation, or a paper heart brought it to the surface again.

  The only emotion strong enough to cut through my anger was my fear. Rose wrote to me, but she’d also abandoned me. She was going by a different name. What if I knocked on her door and she wanted nothing to do with me?

  Calloused fingers knitted with mine, giving my hand a reassuring squeeze. Alec didn’t say anything, but his eyes did the asking: Are you okay? I couldn’t think of a scenario where I’d actually be okay given the situation, but having him at my side, the warmth of his hand in mine… That was exactly what I needed to be brave.

  Hitching up a smile, I said, “Okay, let’s do this.” And then I squared my shoulders and marched up the steps. When I reached the top, I knocked before I had time to panic again. The sound of footsteps followed immediately, along with the chatter of a familiar voice.

  “…probably just Steven. He’s always thinking of excuses to visit. Oh, not at all! He’s totally harmless. It’s kinda cute actually.”

  I heard a click as the deadbolt was unlocked. The door swung open, and—

  There, after all this time, stood my sister.

  She nearly dropped the phone when she saw me.

  Whoever was on the other end said something, because Rose quickly replied, “I gotta go. Call you later.” The phone disappeared into her pocket, but neither of us spoke. We took a long moment to study each other, almost as if we could catch up on the years we’d missed by staring. Finally, she pressed a hand to her chest as if she was feeling physical pain. “Felicity?”

  “Hey,” I responded. Four years apart, and all you can manage is a hey? Genius, Felicity.

  Rose didn’t seem to mind, because she flung her arms out and pulled me into a hug. I tensed at the contact, but as her perfume hit me—vanilla sugar, the same she wore in high school—it was like we’d returned to the night before her birthday all those years ago, before all the pain. We were just two sisters who loved each other, and it was as if no time had passed at all.

  “I can’t believe it’s really you,” she said, pulling away after a long squeeze. She placed both hands on my shoulders and gave me a once-over. “God, you look so grown up.”

  “And you look so…healthy.”

  I didn’t mean to sound surprised. I’d imagined this reunion so many times before. I’d known things would be different between us, that she’d be different, because after four years, how could she not? It wasn’t like I was the same person she’d left behind. Heck, I was different from the person I was two weeks ago. Meeting Alec, discovering the letters, taking off on an adventure—all of these things had changed me.

  But I’d never expected such a transformation from Rose.

  The last time I saw her, she looked sickly. She was too thin and her cheeks were hollow, but now she was back to a regular weight, and there was a glow to her face. And instead of having the overbleached, brittle look I’d grown accustomed to, her hair had its natural golden sheen again. Even the dark circles under her eyes, a permanent fixture from her late-night partying, were gone.

  “Thank you.”

  Awkward silence followed, and Asha attempted to fill it. She leaned around Alec and waved. “Hey, Rose. Long time, no see.”

  “Asha Van de Berg,” she replied, her eyes sparkling with recognition. “Why am I not surprised to see you?”

  “Felicity’s the one person who puts up with my constant complaining, so I decided to keep her around,” Asha joked, and she quickly introduced the boys. Surprisingly, she only mentioned Alec’s first name, and besides a polite smile and hello, Rose didn’t give any indication that she knew who he was.

  “So…” my sister said once she was acquainted with everyone. “What are you guys doing here?”

  “Do you…not want me here?”

  “Of course I do!” Her voice was high with shock and a hint of hurt, like she was insulted I’d suggested otherwise. “Why would you ever think that?”

  “How could I not? You left without saying good-bye, and I’ve spent the past four years wondering if you were alive.”

  Her skin paled as if I was seeing my sister through a black-and-white lens. “You didn’t get my letters?”

  I shook my head. “I found them under Mom’s bed on Friday. She’s been keeping them from me.”

  Rose didn’t respond immediately, but her face was clear enough: eyes thunderous, mouth twisted like she was sucking on a piece of sour candy. “Are you shitting me?” she exclaimed. “That’s so typical of Mom.” She pulled the door all the way open. “You should come in. We obviously need to talk.”

  Five minutes later, I was sitting at my sister’s kitchen table. Her apartment was tiny, but it was so Rose I didn’t mind that every time I shifted in my chair, I knocked my head on the low-hanging cabinet behind me. Picture frames containing snapshots of her travels covered the walls, a collection of seashells lined each windowsill, and then there was the origami: intricate flowers with layers of petals, cute woodland creatures like foxes and squirrels, and a fierce-looking dragon that must have taken hours to complete. The paper foldings were scattered everywhere. The coffee table. The living room bookshelves. Even the kitchen countertops. It was as if they sprouted up from any available surface like wildflowers in a forest.

  Asha, Boomer, and Alec were out exploring restaurants, so it was just the two of us. The three of them had claimed to be hungry, but I knew they were trying to give us some privacy. A bag of Tostitos and salsa were set out between us, and Rose had enough blueberries in the fridge to make me a shake, but neither of us touched the food.

  “So…” Rose said.

  “So…” I said back.

  There was so much I wanted to say, so many questions I needed to ask, but I couldn’t get my brain and mouth to work in unison. Conversations had always been easy between us, but now it felt like forcing small talk with an old acquaintance. It seemed even the natural bond between sisters could break down over time.

  Rose was struggling too. She opened her mouth, then snapped it shut. I watched as she tucked her leg up to her chest, proppin
g her chin on her knee. “I don’t know where to start.”

  “How about with why you ran away,” I said, fiddling with the spoon in my shake.

  “Ran away? Is that what Mom told you?”

  Surprised by the scowl on her face, I could only manage a nod.

  “That’s not what happened,” Rose said, sitting up straight. “Not even close.”

  “So tell me what did.” Reaching out, I lightly brushed her knuckles with the tips of my fingers. I’d meant to take her hand in mine as a comforting gesture but chickened out at the last second.

  Rose deflated in her seat, as if my fleeting touch had punctured her escalating anger. “It’s complicated.”

  I expected her to say more, to start confessing excuses, but she averted her gaze instead.

  I blew out a sigh. “I get that. If it wasn’t complicated, Mom wouldn’t have lied to me, and I wouldn’t have had to drive all the way to Seattle to find you.”

  “I’m still shocked that you never got my letters. I called the post office to make sure they were being picked up, and they were, so I assumed it was you. I never thought that Mom would…” She trailed off, shaking her head. “The night I left, I put a letter on your dresser. It was the first one I wrote to you, and it explained everything. There was a key and instructions inside.”

  “For the PO box?” I asked.

  She nodded. “Mom must’ve seen it before you woke up. I should have done a better job hiding it, but I was afraid you wouldn’t find it.”

  “But…why? Did something happen between you and Mom?”

  “We weren’t getting along,” she said. “Like, at all. Mom had these high expectations for me, and I couldn’t live up to them. She wanted me to get into a good school and study something boring like accounting or law, but that just wasn’t me, you know?”

  “Yeah, I can’t picture you doing someone’s taxes for the rest of your life.” I could see Rose leading safari tours in Africa or running a Jet Ski rental in the Caribbean, but sitting at a desk and crunching numbers from nine to five? Never.

  “Exactly,” she said. “Besides, it’s not like I had the grades to get in anywhere good.”

  “So then what?”

  “Mom kept pushing, so I pushed back. Little stuff at first, like cutting class and sneaking out at night. Then I started partying. Just your typical Friday or Saturday night keggers to blow off steam, but things got bad fast. I would go out every night during the week. I’d skip school during the day and sleep off my hangovers.”

  This I knew. I’d lived through it. But I could tell there was something more, something she wasn’t telling me. “And?”

  “The drinking turned to drugs”—she hesitated—“and then I got arrested.”

  “You got arrested?” The question exploded from my lips. “For what?”

  “Possession with the intent to sell,” she confessed. My expression must have said it all, because Rose was quick to add, “It was only a little weed, and it belonged to my friend Jimmy, not me. He got pulled over on our way home from a party. We’d been smoking, and the cop could smell it, so he searched the car and found bags, a scale, and Jimmy’s stash in the trunk. I didn’t know it was back there. We both got hauled in, but Jimmy admitted it was his, so I didn’t get charged with anything.”

  “When was this?” I asked. Melted ice cream was running down the side of my milk shake glass, but I pushed the drink aside, untouched.

  “The week before I left.” Rose let out a humorless laugh. “Mom had to pick me up from the precinct. When we got home, she snapped. Kept going on about how my arrest was the final straw, and how I had to get my act together because she wouldn’t be bailing me out of jail anymore. ‘Rosalyn, once you turn eighteen,’” she said, mimicking Stern Mom’s voice, “‘I expect you to act like a responsible adult. And if you’re adamant about not going to school, then you need to get a job and contribute to household expenses. There will be no freeloading under this roof.’”

  As livid as I was with my mother, her demand wasn’t as unreasonable as Rose was making it out to be. “And?” I asked, still waiting for an explanation.

  Rose lifted both hands and shook her head. “She wanted me to pay rent and follow all her rules. Why would I ever agree to that? If I have to be fiscally responsible for myself, I sure as hell am not going put up with her tyranny.”

  “So…you ran away,” I said, repeating what seemed to be the most logical interpretation of what had happened.

  “No, I already told you that,” she replied through a taut jaw. “When I refused to sign her ultimatum—seriously, Mom drew up a freaking contract—she kicked me out of the house. Told me to stay out of your life until you’d graduated from high school and got into college.”

  Mom did what? I pressed my palms flat against the table and tried to remain calm. “What does any of this have to do with me?”

  “She was worried about you.”

  I blinked. “Why?”

  “Beats me,” Rose said, shrugging. “Maybe she was afraid that my mistakes and rebellion would rub off on you. How she ever thought we’d turn out the same is beyond me…”

  “Because I blindly listen to every lie she tells?” I snapped, unable to keep the venom from my voice. I wasn’t mad at Rose as much as I was at myself. I’d trusted my mom so fully and in every aspect of my life. It never occurred to me that she was purposely keeping me in the dark.

  “No, because you’re driven and dedicated and hardworking… My opposite.”

  Okay, I’d give her that. We were the inverse of each other: her unruly and me docile. And that major difference made me pause.

  If Mom asked something of me, I did what I was told, no questions asked. But Rose didn’t have an obedient bone in her body. When Mom told her to do something, whether it was as simple as coming home before curfew or taking out the garbage, she’d made a point of doing the opposite. So why, of all times, did Rose choose to obey her when she wanted to separate us?

  Sure, she sent the letters, but that seemed inconsequential considering she’d been cut out of my life. There were no phone calls. No emails. Why didn’t she decide to hell with Mom and show up for a surprise visit on the holidays?

  “Rose, I’m still confused,” I said. “If you cared so little for Mom’s rules, why did you stay away?”

  She swallowed, gaze fixed on the ground, and I couldn’t place her expression. Was she embarrassed about something?

  “Felicity, you have to understand. When I left, I had no job, no way to support myself.” She bit her lip, and the look on her face finally resonated with me. Rose looked guilty. “I needed the money to get back on my feet.”

  “What are you talking about?” I asked, eyes narrowing. “What money?”

  There was a second or two of silence as she hesitated, but then she said, “The educational trust that Mom and Dad set up for me. I was never going to use it for school, so Mom gave me access on the condition that I keep out of your life.”

  I stared at her, trying to process the enormity of what she’d said. “Mom paid you to stay away?”

  “Hey, listen to me,” Rose said, stretching across the table for my hand. “Leaving you behind was one of the toughest things I’ve ever done, okay? But I needed to figure out me, and I couldn’t do that at home. Not with Mom. Things were too toxic between us.”

  I pulled my hand away from hers.

  No one needed to remind me of how unhealthy my sister and mother’s relationship had been. So I understood why Rose had to make a clean break from her—and consequently, me. But that didn’t mean the truth didn’t hurt like hell.

  “Fel?” Rose whispered, and I’d never heard her sound so small before. “Please don’t hate me.”

  I dropped my chin to my chest so she couldn’t see my expression. “It’s her I hate, not you.”

  “Don’t say that, Fel
icity.”

  My head snapped up so fast I smacked it on the cabinet behind me, but I was too surprised by her response to feel any of the pain. “Why not?”

  “Because she loves you and—”

  “Whoa, hold up.” I lifted a hand to stop her. “Are you seriously defending her right now?”

  “I’m not saying what she did was right, because it definitely wasn’t.” Rose said, backtracking. “But take it from someone who spent years loathing her. It’s not worth it.”

  “So you’ve forgiven her?” I asked, incredulous. “After everything she’s done?”

  “Not entirely, but I’m trying, because I want to be happy,” she said. “Hatred takes up more space in your heart than you realize, and it doesn’t leave room for things like love and joy. Trust me.”

  “You don’t understand, Rose. Everything I’ve done since you left has been for Mom. Everyone who loved her abandoned her, and I felt this responsibility to make up for that.” I wrapped my arms around my stomach. “Stupid thirteen-year-old me figured if I study law at Stanford, become a lawyer, and am successful, then maybe she’d be happy again.”

  “You don’t need a fancy diploma or a job at a law firm to do that, Fel. You make her happy.”

  “That’s not the point. All the choices I’ve made over the past four years have been based on a lie!” I exclaimed.

  “Are you saying that you wouldn’t have studied as hard if you’d known the truth about me leaving, or if I’d never left at all?” Rose asked, shooting me a disbelieving look. “Because if that’s the case, maybe Mom made the right decision.”

  “How can you say that? I’ve spent all this time focusing on becoming the person I thought would make her happy instead of the person I want to be, and now I feel like I don’t know who I am.”

  “You’re only seventeen,” Rose said with a laugh. “Nobody knows exactly who they are at that age. Shit, I’m twenty-two and I’m still figuring out who I am.”

  I couldn’t think of a response—at least, not one that would help Rose see my perspective. Learning the truth about what’d happened four years ago was exhausting and more emotionally draining than I’d anticipated.