What She Left Us

by Stephanie Elliot

  “Let’s enjoy now,” Jenna said. “No deep talks like that yet, ‘kay?”

  “Okay, not yet. I don’t even know where I’ll be after training.”

  “Exactly,” Jenna traced her tattoo, remembering the scratchy cat-like feel of the needle pricking in and out of her skin. Recalling the promise they made to one another that night, on their first anniversary of dating. To be together forever.

  “Does it seem like we’ve even been apart?” she glanced at Darren.

  “Yeah, too damn much, actually.” he said sadly.

  “Yeah, me too,” she agreed. “Me too.”

  They drove in silence for a while, a silence they weren’t used to. They had never shared silence. There were always words between them, bantering back and forth, because there was always something going on, they had always been together, they had always shared everything. Now though, things had shifted, and they were there to see if they could get it back, their solidarity, their oneness. That’s what this trip was all about.

  “We’ll be okay though, right,” Jenna’s voice cracked.

  “I hope so. That’s what I want,” Darren said, slipping his hand into hers, matching up their tattoos. They continued to drive in silence, but it didn’t feel as lonely as it did minutes before, now that his hand was in hers, now that their tattoos connected again.

  Chapter 54

  “I can’t go with you Mitch.”

  Courtney had been crying non-stop since she and Mitch left Dr. Rhetler’s office and Mitch was doing everything he could to console her. Still, nothing worked. It had felt to Courtney like a death, worse than a death actually, and she didn’t know what was happening.

  Was her whole life a complete lie?

  She felt confusion, misunderstanding, anger, sadness, rage, hurt, and she had no idea who to direct these feelings toward. Was she not her mother’s daughter? Did she not belong to her father? Was she not related to her very own sister? How was she going to find out these answers? And then, quick as a flash, through her mind, she wondered, did her sister know the truth about her?

  No. Jenna wouldn’t have kept such a horrible secret from her for a lifetime. This would devastate Jenna as well. But what exactly did this mean to Courtney. Was she adopted? She had to find out answers, and that meant she couldn’t go home with Mitch to meet his family over Thanksgiving. How on earth could she pretend to be happy to meet his family when she was having this crisis? When she didn’t even know who her own family was?

  “You see why I can’t go, don’t you?” she asked him again.

  “Yes, but I wish you would come. Or I could stay. Do you want me to stay tonight? I could help you go through your mother’s things?” he offered.

  She had said no but Mitch drove her back to her mom’s house, because Courtney had no other idea on what to do or where to begin her search. She figured she would go through the things there, to look for clues, to search for something, anything to give her an idea on who she might really be. Because it was certain now that she wasn’t actually born Courtney Haddonfield.

  When Mitch kissed her goodbye very reluctantly, Courtney cried harder. “I’ll stay. Let me stay and help you.” He ran his fingers through her hair and she held his hands for a minute, considering his offer. She wanted him to stay with her. She wanted him more than anything. She didn’t want to stay in the lonely house by herself, the house where she had grown up, lived with her family, only to now discover it had all been a lie.

  Her whole life was a complete lie.

  Finally, Courtney said, “No. Go. Call me when you get to your parents. And make up an excuse on why I couldn’t come. Tell them I'm still in the hospital, anything. Tell them I’m really sorry,” she said.

  “I’ll tell them you’ll come for Christmas,” he said.

  After Mitch left, Courtney dried her tears and started in her mom’s closet. She tore through it like a crazed woman, first with a box of old photos.

  There were the grade school photos first, the ones where she and Jenna had matching haircuts, even though they were five full years apart – bangs across the eyes, and a blunt cut below the ears, not quite Dorothy Hamill, not quite Dutch boy from the paint cans. Courtney remembered always wanting to emulate Jenna’s style and Jenna always wanting to change it up, to not have to be the same as her little sister.

  Well, look now Jenna, you’re not anything like me after all. We’re not even sisters.

  Next Courtney found the dance pictures. They had both taken dance classes, and Jenna had been the one who had excelled. Pink tutus and leotards, hands in the air in pirouettes, feet in position one, smiles plastered on their faces. Courtney remembered the time they had both performed in The Nutcracker. Jenna had danced as a Sugarplum Fairy while Courtney had been relegated to a dancing Candy Cane. Courtney, always second place. It was all beginning to make sense.

  There were sports pictures, Jenna's piano recital photos, first dates and dances where boys whose names were long forgotten pinned flowers onto dresses she couldn’t fathom they thought were pretty. Graduation from elementary, junior high, then high school. Her life was all nicely Kodak-preserved. It all looked pretty normal. A pretty normal life.

  Then she found the first few years of life, tucked way at the bottom of the box, and before she was born. When it was just her mom, dad and Jenna. The three of them. First, her pregnant mom with her dad. Her mom was big and pregnant, her dad with his arms wrapped proudly around her stomach. Pictures of a nursery. A pretty yellow and green room with a zoo theme – a giraffe picture on the wall and a stuffed monkey, and her mother smiling in a rocking chair, her belly blooming large. Then hospital baby photos. Courtney knew these were of Jenna by the date digitally stamped on the back of the photos. There were a lot of these first baby photos.

  Courtney was three hours into her search when Jenna called. She hadn’t talked to her since she left early that morning.

  Keep calm, keep calm, she told herself as she answered.

  “Hey,” Courtney said trying to not let her voice crack with emotion.

  “Hi! How are you? How’d the appointment go?” Jenna asked.

  “Good, all’s good. She checked me out and I’m good.” Courtney bit the inside of her cheek to keep from freaking out or crying or telling Jenna to come home and help her figure out everything. She was fighting the urge to be mad and angry at Jenna, to blame her for all of this, when deep inside, she knew Jenna had no idea of any of this.

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, really,” Courtney said.

  “Cool. So are you at Mitch’s now?”

  “Yep.” Another lie.

  “How’s his family?” Jenna asked.

  “We kind of just got here. I should go, still going through the introductions.” Courtney needed to get off the phone with Jenna, and fast. She was about to lose it. “Can I call you later?”

  “Yeah. Oh, Darren says hi. We’re at the beach! It’s awesome weather!” Jenna said. “Love you!”

  “Me too. Bye.” And Courtney clicked off the phone.

  She needed fresh air, and she needed it fast. She got up from the floor in her mom’s room and bounded down the stairs and out the front door, grabbing her purse on the way out. There was a convenient store on the corner. She hadn’t eaten since that morning and she knew she had to eat. Oh wait, she didn’t have the disease so it wasn’t really important for her to eat anymore, she thought to herself and despite how crazy she felt, she laughed at the idea of it all.

  Still, she walked briskly to the corner, arms across her chest, because she left her jacket at the house, and it was late November, and it was freezing out. He mind was going a million miles, thinking about all that had happened within the last eight hours. She couldn’t deal.

  When she got to the store, she pulled open the door and the bells jangled. The smell of burnt coffee smacked her senses. Rows and rows of half-filled orange coffee carafes sizzled on the burners, but even though Courtney was chilled from her walk, she passed t
hem by and went to the refrigerated drinks instead. She grabbed a Red Bull, shaking her head as she did so, because she had never had a Red Bull in her entire life. She also grabbed a ready-made turkey sandwich and a bag of Funyuns.

  “Cramming for finals?” the cashier asked.

  “Something like that,” Courtney attempted a smile.

  “Have a nice day.” He handed Courtney a plastic bag and she walked out of the store, grateful to get away from the burnt coffee smell and back into the freezing cold air.

  Back at the house, she slammed the Red Bull, because she figured that was what you were supposed to do when drinking an energy drink, and then she ate the sandwich and Funyuns. The sandwich was stale and the Funyuns left an oniony film of preservatives on her tongue. The Red Bull did give her a burst of unexpected energy she was suddenly grateful for.

  She remembered there were some photo albums stuck at the top of her mom’s closet so she went back upstairs and pulled them down onto the floor.

  There were birthday party pictures when she and Jenna were probably around three and eight, with piñatas and party hats, and photos from school trips and family vacations. She found some from a trip to Disney.

  Courtney remembered her breakfast with the princesses and how she fell in love with Jasmine, while all the other little girls had surrounded themselves around Snow White and Cinderella. Courtney had Jasmine all to herself and she had fawned all over Courtney. There was Courtney in the photo, standing next to Princess Jasmine, her smile big and bright, with the princess of her dreams. Jenna had waited and waited for time with Cinderella, and never got the chance for a picture with her. Even then, they were so different, choosing completely opposite princesses to love.

  There were pictures of them in the very backyard of their parent’s house, swinging on the blue and yellow sturdy swing set, playing in the blow-up kiddy pool. They had splashed for hours, blowing bubbles, having picnics, playing in the rain, doing sister things. Had she ever not felt like a sister? As she went through the pictures, she felt a grief she couldn’t understand, as if she were searching through someone else’s life, of a person’s she would never truly know. Not her own life.

  Then she found pictures pre-Courtney.

  There was Jenna, around age five, smiling at the camera, in her bathing suit. Courtney took a couple photos out of the plastic sleeves of the album, and turned them over. The digital dates on the back indicated it was spring before Courtney was born. Courtney recognized the location of the photo – St. Petersburg, Florida, where they had gone every year as children, and there was the big pink hotel in the background. Jenna smiling, holding a sand bucket.

  Courtney turned the page, and there were more photos from that vacation. Jenna digging holes in the sand, Jenna and her father walking hand in hand on the beach, Jenna holding up a starfish she must have found on the beach, making a stinky face. Jenna, cheeks sunburned.

  But the one photo, the one that dropped Courtney to her knees, that made her weep for the loss of a family she thought she had, the one that made her doubt all that she ever thought was true about her sole existence was the one she found on the very next page.

  It was of her sister again, but this time her mother was with her. Her not-quite-five-year-old sister, Jenna, was wearing a two-piece blue and white bikini. And then there was her mother. Standing in the surf, she was wearing a sleek, black suit, grasping onto Jenna’s hand, making sure the waves didn’t carry her daughter out to sea. And with her other hand, she held wisps of her hair away from her face, and her smile was enormous.

  To any other viewer looking at the photograph, one might decide the picture looked infectious, contagious, evoking smiles and wonder about a mother and daughter spending the day at the beach. All that ran through Courtney’s mind was: thisisitthisisitthisisitthisisit.

  This is my undoing.

  In the photograph, her mother had a beautiful expression. She was looking sideways toward a stormy sea, yet glimmers of sun shown still, cascading upon the two subjects in the photo. Judging by how her mother was keeping the wind from her face, a storm was brewing. Her mother was holding tightly onto Jenna’s hand, shielding her from the wind as well, and Jenna’s face was turned into her mother's thigh. The date on the back of the photo confirmed that it was taken exactly two months before Courtney was born, and her mother, in the black, very sleek, very revealing bathing suit, was the very opposite of pregnant.

  Which revealed only one terrible obvious certainty:

  It was true. Courtney was not her mother’s daughter.

  Chapter 56

  Darren was out for a run and Jenna stepped out of the shower and was toweling dry her hair when her cell phone rang. It was the day after Thanksgiving and they planned on driving down the coast and having lunch at a little place Darren said had the most amazing crab legs. It was a little shack right on the beach that only locals knew about, he said. They had live steel drum music, cold beer, and the crab legs were so good and fresh, you didn’t even need to dunk them in butter. Sunsets were supposed to be some of the most spectacular in the world, and Darren said he had reserved a double hammock for the two of them. They were going to stay the night in a quaint little beachside bungalow, snorkel in the morning, lounge in hammocks in the afternoon, and come back later the next evening.

  Jenna was sure this was when he was going to give her back the ring. This was when he was going to say let’s give it a shot again. She was ready this time. Her head was back on straight. They were getting along beautifully, they had spent the past two days just being together, being themselves with one another, like they used to be. And sleeping together in the same bed again – what a luxury. How she had missed that. And she didn’t mean just the sex. Although that was incredible too. But waking up next to him, being in his arms, seeing him next to her, feeling his body next to hers, watching him watch her. Tracing his lashes with her fingertips, down to his chin, touching him everywhere. Figuring him out again. Taking the time she needed to remember why she fell in love with him, why she loved him so much.

  And she was so proud of all he was doing, and he was great at his job – training was going so well for him, and she knew he was there for a reason, a reason for good. He was all about doing good, saving lives, and this was so important to him. He had a purpose, a purpose for making people well, and this was what he wanted to do in his life, and it was wonderful.

  And what did she want to do? She didn’t even really have a purpose? She had quit school, gone to live with her sister. Her purpose now was to make herself well, and to support him. Yes, that was what her focus was going to be. Maybe her purpose was to support and love him. She could do that. Maybe her purpose was to be a loving and supporting wife. Maybe, just maybe, getting the disease was actually a wake-up call she needed, the wake-up call for her to slow things down, take a step back and see what life had to offer, take stock in what was important. That family was important, that Darren was important, that her sister was important, that her life was important.

  Her thoughts were all over the place when she was drying her hair so when she reached for her phone she missed Courtney’s call. Jenna figured she was checking in after Thanksgiving and she would call her after Darren re-proposed. Was that even a word? Do men re-propose marriage?

  She sure hoped that was Darren’s plan.

  Because she was absolutely ready to say yes.

  Chapter 57

  After Courtney figured out what she thought she already knew, she went through everything else in the closet, and her mother’s drawers, further tearing the room apart like a burglar ransacking a house. She found all sorts of random paperwork, old report cards, tax documents, bills, expired passports, but not what she was looking for – her birth certificate. Why had she never had a copy of that? And where the fuck was it? More importantly, who the fuck was she?

  Finally, late into the night, she gave up. She crawled into her mother’s bed, and pulled the crocheted blanket over her exhausted body.
/>   She was ready to sleep.

  But she couldn’t. Memories of her childhood kept her awake. She remembered all of the times they were a family. And she remembered all of the times she felt lost in her family, like she didn’t belong. She thought of when her father had left. When she was only eleven. She and Jenna had thought it was something they had done for such a long time, but their parents had insisted the divorce had nothing to do with them. But now that she thought about it, maybe it was her fault. Had Courtney’s existence caused problems in her parent’s marriage, caused them to fight and then later end it all? She knew they fought behind closed doors often, but there was never another woman, or a seemingly outward legitimate reason for their divorce.

  Once their dad was gone, and it was the three of them, things were better for a little while, but still, most of the concentration had been on Jenna – plans for her going to college took precedence over what Courtney was doing in middle school, and then, soon after, Jenna left.

  Courtney remembered the day Jenna left for college. It had been one of the saddest days in Courtney’s life. She was going to a small school down state about five hours away, and Courtney couldn’t believe her sister was leaving her. She had been so mad at her choice of where to go to college. How could Jenna choose that school over a closer one? How could she want to leave her? The car was packed full of crates and clothes, and things a freshman would need for school – new bedding and supplies, and all Courtney had done the weeks prior to Jenna’s departure was sulk and ignore Jenna. They hadn’t even spent time together those last few weeks they had together.

  When Jenna tried to hug her goodbye, Courtney kept her hands at her sides. She felt her eyes filling up as her sister held onto her, as Jenna told her how much she loved her and how much she was going to miss her. She promised to write, and to call, and to send pictures, and she already planned for Courtney to visit at Little Sibs weekend, which was coming up in October.