The Sisters Chase

by Sarah Healy

  “But the language you used toward Mrs. Violette cannot be tolerated.”

  Mary lifted her chin and looked at Mr. Alvetto with big wet eyes, then made the slightest adjustment of her hips. “I’m sorry,” she said, letting her gaze drop as she took another breast-expanding breath. She felt his hand drop down just a fraction of an inch lower on her back. “I feel terrible.”

  She shifted her weight just a bit more, pushing her hips ever so slightly forward. So subtle were her motions that no one except Mary herself would be able to recognize their artful deliberateness. Mr. Alvetto backed up suddenly, red faced and flustered.

  “You shouldn’t blame yourself, Mary,” he sputtered, while trying to hide the bottom half of his body behind his desk. “I think you need to take a little more time to cope with what’s happened. Why don’t you take the rest of the day, and we’ll start fresh tomorrow?”

  And Mary almost laughed. Sometimes she just couldn’t believe how easy it was. But instead she made her face look tortured and let her gaze drop down to her feet, thinking only of her pleasure at the thought of Mrs. Violette learning that she had been given the afternoon off. “Okay, Mr. Alvetto.”

  “I’ll handle everything with Mrs. Violette.”

  Mary nodded, still trying to look ashamed and remorseful. “Thank you.”

  So Mary went home, picked Hannah up from Mrs. Pool’s, and took her to McDonald’s for lunch.

  “When’s my birthday?” asked Hannah, as she took a bite of her cheeseburger.

  “On February fourteenth,” answered Mary. “Valentine’s Day.”

  “I’m going to be five.”

  Mary made herself smile. “You are.”

  They got back to the Water’s Edge just as the mail truck was pulling away, leaving a fresh crop of sympathy cards. There was a thick one on the top from her mother’s cousin, Gail. Their Christmas card always included a photograph, and Mary recalled the way her mother had always studied it when it came. In the last, she was posed with her husband and son on a cream-colored couch, a large abstract painting hanging in the background. Mary had heard her mother make enough comments to know that Gail and her husband had money—he was an entrepreneur and had recently been elected to the state senate. They think they’re God’s gift.

  After Mary put Hannah to bed that night, she filled another bucket with water and carried it—sloshing and steaming—into another guest room. And that night as she cleaned, she pictured Gail’s husband, with his tanned skin and dirty blond hair. She pictured Mr. Alvetto blushing and hiding behind his desk. She pictured the lawyer with his shabby suit and fat fingers.

  Her hands were red and raw, her skin thin from the water and the cleansers, but Mary scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed. She knew that she wouldn’t raise Hannah in Sandy Bank. Sandy Bank was where people died. Her grandmother had died during childbirth, bleeding to death on the delivery table. Her grandfather had lingered for only three months after his diagnosis. And her mother had driven her car into a telephone pole, her organs pulverized. Even the town itself died every winter.

  No, she and Hannah wouldn’t stay in Sandy Bank. They would leave. They would disappear, two princesses escaping in the night, running through the Black Woods with wolves at their heels. It was the two of them now, the last of their house. They would be deceitful when they had to, they would use the powers they were granted, and they would make their way back to the one person Mary always knew she would once again find. And that evening, as the knees of Mary’s jeans grew stiff and wet, as her hands went back and forth, she devised her plan.

  Five

  1981

  Mary noticed the way Hannah sat up in the backseat, angling herself to get a better view of the palm-shaded gatehouse at the entrance to Cocoplum Estates. An elderly black man stood from his stool and waved the Mercedes through, tipping his hat to Gail, but Gail was too busy sizing up the two girls in her backseat to notice.

  “We’re so glad you’re able to spend Christmas with us,” said Gail, her red lips forming a false smile, her voice carrying an anxious lilt. “It was just such a surprise.”

  Mary softened her face. “We just wanted to be around family,” she said, wrapping one of her arms around Hannah. “And the card you sent was so nice.”

  Mary watched as Gail’s smile faltered as she recalled the rote sentiment and empty offer she had included in the sympathy card she’d mailed after Diane’s death. If you need anything at all, we’re here for you. You are not alone. Gail had surely thought it classy, elegant—that morsel of sympathy tossed from her jewel-bedecked hand. Mary had to look out of the window to keep from laughing. She remembered the silence on the other end of the phone when she first called her mother’s cousin. Hannah and I are hoping to come for Christmas. We bought our tickets!

  Cocoplum Estates was a cluster of massive homes with white stucco exteriors and orange clay roofs set against a cloudless blue sky. Their backyards all had kidney-shaped aquamarine pools and enormous central air-conditioning units that whirred in unison to create a constant pervasive white noise. There were tennis courts and sidewalks and a marina, but Mary didn’t see a soul outside aside from the hunched gardeners with sweat-slick faces who tended to the sprinkler-fed lawns.

  “Here we are,” said Gail, as the Mercedes turned onto the smooth black driveway of one of the nearly identical homes in the community. Sailing into the garage, Gail brought the car to a stop, then turned to look back at her cousin’s daughters once again. Hannah was leaning in close to Mary, shrinking against the enormity that surrounded her.

  “Alright, girls,” said Gail, opening the door. Thick humid air rushed into the cool, clean car as she swung her tanned, tennis-toned legs onto the concrete. She then took a deep strength-gathering breath before rising. “Let’s get your bags.”

  Mary took Hannah’s hand. “Come on, Bunny,” she whispered.

  The girls followed Gail to the back of the car, where she popped the trunk and stared down at the three large suitcases the girls had brought with them. It did not look like the luggage of two girls who had come for a weeklong visit. It looked like the luggage of guests who planned on staying for a while. “Oh, my goodness,” Gail had said, when she saw Mary haul the suitcases off the baggage carousel at the airport, a manic laugh sputtering out. She looked at Mary, clearly hoping for reassurance that the planned duration of their visit had not changed or that the enormity of their bags could be otherwise explained. But Mary had just smiled sweetly. “I hope these will fit your car.”

  Gail reached in and pulled out the smallest of the three bags while Mary picked up the remaining two. With Hannah at her heels, Mary followed Gail’s padding steps as she pulled open the door that led to the kitchen.

  “So here we are,” she said, unable to resist the rush of pleasure she felt when displaying her home. Like a docent revealing the prize work in a museum’s collection, Gail Dackard extended her hand toward her kitchen and the mauve and gray living room beyond. “Chez Dackard.”

  “Wow,” said Mary, as she took in the room, with its arches and columns and gaudy abstract art. “This is beautiful.”

  “Well,” Gail demurred, as she set her purse on the countertop next to a vase containing spiky sprays of birds-of-paradise. “It’s home.”

  After a quick tour of the house, Gail showed the girls to their room. Leading them up a wide staircase to the second floor, she glanced behind them to ensure no footprints had been left on her cream carpet. Hannah stuck tightly to Mary’s side and averted her eyes each time the path of Gail’s gaze neared her. The room in which they would be staying was large and comfortable, and had its own private bath; and Gail felt the need to walk them through the suite, pointing out the bed and the sink and the closet.

  Finally, Gail said, “Alright, I’ll let you girls get settled. Ron will be home soon with Tim, so feel free to wash up or have a rest.” She forced another smile. “Make yourselves at home.” And then she ducked out of the room.

  The moment the
door clicked shut, Mary and Hannah fell into each other, giddy and grateful to be alone again. “Oomph,” joked Mary, as Hannah’s head hit her hip with a thump. “Take it easy, Bunny.”

  Mary sat down on the bed and pulled Hannah onto her lap. Hannah looked at Mary with wide, earnest eyes. “This is a really pretty house,” she said, as if the fact were somewhat worrisome.

  Mary rested her hand on Hannah’s head, pushing her hair away from her face. “It’s pretty enough.”

  “They have a light made out of diamonds,” said Hannah, referring, Mary assumed, to the baguette-prism chandelier that hung over the dining-room table.

  “The light was nice.”

  “And everything is pink.”

  “Well . . . if Princess Hannah and Princess Mary lived here, they’d make it even prettier. There would be a big golden bed and a ballroom with velvet curtains and windows that went from the floor all the way up to the sky.”

  “Yeah,” said Hannah, her eyes full of worlds Mary created. Mary smiled as she watched Hannah’s gaze lifting up through the ceiling into the heavens.

  For the next hour, Mary opened bags, put a few things in drawers, and lounged with Hannah. Hannah lay on the bed and asked questions about the plane they had flown on and about when they were going to go back home.

  “Well, we can go back in about a week if we want to,” replied Mary, as she pulled out her enormous cosmetic case and set it on the dresser. The green floral bag was dingy with makeup and carried with it Mary’s exotic powdery scent. She pulled out a tube of lip gloss and leaned into the mirror. “But we’re going to see how it goes,” she said, as she slicked it on.

  Mary had used the insurance payout for Diane’s car to purchase their tickets to Miami. The Pools had arranged for Diane’s funeral, and Mary gave them most of the money that she had gathered and saved to help with the costs. But she now had only a few hundred dollars left. Diane hadn’t purchased life insurance, perhaps because she was so young. Or perhaps because she was already financially burdened without the additional monthly payment. It was a gamble coming to Florida; Mary knew that. She took a small aerosol can of fragrance from her bag, leaned her head back, and sprayed a cloud of the scent onto her neck, her hand circling as she did so like a bird in dizzy flight. Then she took an appraising look at herself. She really was beautiful. She thought this without joy or emotion. She thought this with the focus of someone who had just put down her last dollar on what had always been her lucky number.

  MARY AND HANNAH SAT BESIDE EACH OTHER at the dinner table. Gail passed around a bowl of pasta salad; she had made chicken nuggets for Hannah. “So, Tim,” said Gail, in a hostess voice. “Mary and Hannah are your second cousins.” Gail smiled at her shy, sullen son. “And Mary’s only a couple of years older than you.”

  “Second cousins,” mused Ron, who sat at the head of the table, occupying it fully with both his ego and physical presence. “That means you two could get married.”

  Tim blushed and scowled and mumbled something toward his plate, but Mary let out a gracious and appreciative laugh, leaning forward and smiling back at Tim’s father. “Well, maybe we’ll start with being friends,” she said.

  Though his father watched him, waiting for him to engage in repartee with the lovely young woman seated across the table, Tim—seemingly so ill-suited to being Ron Dackard’s son—continued to stare at his plate. Diane had nurtured a deep jealousy of her cousin and had spoken enough about Gail’s husband for Mary to know that Ron hadn’t come from an illustrious background. He was the son of a postal worker. But having made a series of very shrewd business moves early in his career, he now owned a large chain of automobile-maintenance shops called LubeTime, which specialized in the thirty-minute oil change, and he had leveraged his success into a budding political career. Mary sensed that Ron could be merciless and single-minded when it came to getting what he wanted. She could tell because she was, too.

  “So, Tim,” said Ron, stabbing a bite of his pasta salad. “Are you going to show the girls around the neighborhood after dinner? Take them down to the marina?”

  Tim’s head jerked up, his expression half-terrified, half-furious.

  “That would be fun,” Mary offered, smiling at Tim and then his father.

  “Ron,” whined Gail, with a soft, annoyed chuckle. “It’s a school night. And I’m sure the girls are tired.”

  There was a collective glance toward Hannah, who had just surreptitiously put a whole chicken nugget in her mouth. Hannah’s eyes widened at the attention. She had been quietly consuming her dinner hoping that no one would notice her. Mary gently took her chin.

  “Are you tired, Bunny?”

  Mary nodded once, almost imperceptibly, and so Hannah did, too.

  “Well, maybe once Hannah goes to bed, Tim can take Mary down there,” decreed Ron Dackard.

  Mary and Ron and Gail spent the rest of the dinner mentioning the goings-on of family members that none of them knew very well at all and agreeing that Florida was pleasant in the winter but that the North, with its change of seasons, had its own charms. Hannah and Tim sat silently eating. Ron asked Mary how she was managing without Diane. And Mary sighed, looked at Hannah, then stroked her sister’s head. “We’re hanging in there,” she replied, in a voice that wasn’t quite her own.

  Mary helped Gail clear the table and load the plates into the dishwasher while Tim escaped to his room and Ron pretended to enjoy playing hide-and-seek with Hannah.

  “So your mother’s finances . . . ,” Gail began, as she and Mary stood together in front of the sink rinsing and loading. “Are you girls provided for?”

  Mary’s chin dropped as she handed Gail a plate. “She did what she could.”

  “Well, that motel,” said Gail, the anxiety making her voice tinny and shrill. “I’m sure you could get something for the motel.”

  “I don’t know if it’s going to be enough.”

  And Gail turned the water hotter, higher.

  When Mary put Hannah to bed that evening, she filled their big pink bathtub to the brim, adding way too much bubble bath so that Hannah was surrounded by peaks of white fluff. “When we last saw our beautiful princesses,” Mary began, starting to spin one of her tales, “Princess Hannah was trapped in the cloud kingdom.” But Hannah wasn’t in the mood for a story tonight.

  “Mary?” started Hannah, her light blond hair messy and wild, her eyes almost disproportionately large. “When can we go home?”

  “Oh, Bunny,” said Mary, lifting her hand out of the water to place it on her sister’s head. “It’ll be soon.”

  Hannah looked down into the soapy bubbles, and Mary could tell by the set of her chin that she was trying not to cry. “I miss Mom.”

  Mary watched Hannah for a moment, and she felt a tugging inside her, painful but precious and pure. “I know,” she said.

  “When can we go save her?”

  Mary’s hand whirled slowly through the bubbles. “I’m not sure.”

  Hannah hadn’t understood the funeral, hadn’t understood what it meant to be dead. As she stood staring at the enormous flower-ringed box with its lid shut tightly, Hannah kept asking where their mother was. And so Mary told her a tale, whispering in her ear that Diane had been on a journey and was pricked by a poisonous thorn, and now she would sleep unless Princess Hannah and Princess Mary could find the enchanted scroll, the words of which held a magic powerful enough to bring back a dead mother.

  HANNAH FELL ASLEEP EARLY, Mary tickling her back until her eyes slipped shut. Then in the dark of their room, Mary applied another coat of lip gloss, ran her fingers through her hair, and moved silently back down the wide cream-colored stairs.

  Gail and Ron were facing each other, their arms crossed over their chest, their whispers turning into too-eager smiles as soon as Mary entered the room.

  “Hey,” said Ron, clapping his hands together on seeing Mary. “There she is!”

  Gail took a sip of her white wine and looked away while Ron summoned Ti
m on the intercom system. “Tim!” he said curtly. And that was all it took. Tim came slinking down the stairs, hands in his pockets, his chin elevated regally. He brushed silently past both Mary and his parents, and went right out the door that led to the garage, leaving only stares in his wake. It was a fledgling defiance that Mary recognized at once. “Well,” she said, with a good-natured shrug. “I’ll see you in a bit.”

  Ron made a noise of disgust toward his son, as Mary followed Tim out the open door into the humid night.

  “Hey, Tim!” called Mary, as she jogged to catch up with him. He was walking quickly without looking back. “Wait up.”

  But Tim didn’t slow nor did he look at her even after she had reached him. For a minute or two, they walked in silence as Mary worked to keep his pace, sprinklers spitting and whirring in the dark between spotlight-illuminated palms.

  Finally, Tim spoke, his eyes gazing straight ahead, his steps not slowing. “My mom doesn’t want you here. She thinks you’re looking for a handout.”

  He had meant it to sting. Mary took a moment to think tactically. Tim didn’t like girls, she could tell. So her usual arsenal was of little use. But Tim went on. “She put some of her jewelry and the silverware in a safe-deposit box,” he said. “She thinks you’re going to steal it.”

  Mary stopped suddenly, and the surprise of it made Tim stop, too. He turned around to look at her. She stared at him for a moment, and she saw the effort it took for him to hold her gaze. Looking Mary in the eyes could be like staring into the sun. “You could,” she said, nodding her chin in his direction. “You could take something and say it was us after we’re gone.”

  Tim let out a vicious laugh. Mary had been right to play off his hatred for his parents. He was imagining it now, a pair of diamond earrings sitting in his sock drawer as his mother went wild, pulling her room apart looking for them. “They’re such assholes,” he spat. “My mom pretending to be all perfect, but she’s so scared that her dead cousin’s kids are going to ask her for some money that she told me that we have to keep Christmas ‘humble’ this year. In case you guys saw how much shit she usually buys. We’re going to have a second Christmas on New Year’s when I’ll get the rest of my presents.”