“Kate’s always been fine. She can look after herself. You’re wrong,” I sob.
“I’m sorry, love,” he whispers as he puts his arm underneath my head and lifts me off the floor. “I’m so sorry.”
He kisses my cheek but I feel nothing. My body goes limp as he carries me through the room and back into the conservatory.
“She’s not dead,” I tell him as he puts me down in the chair. “If she was dead I would know.”
“It’s a big shock,” he says, putting his hand on my forehead. “A lot to take in . . .”
“I said she’s not dead,” I yell, pushing him away. “Now just piss off and leave me alone.”
“Look, Sally,” he says, “I think I should stay with you, at least for a bit. You’re in shock.”
“Didn’t you hear me? I said I want to be alone.”
“Okay,” he says, stepping toward the door. “Whatever you wish.”
“And close those bloody blinds,” I say. “The sun’s giving me a headache.”
I hear his footsteps on the wooden floor as he goes to the window.
“Is that better?” he asks as the light disappears and I nod my head, glad of the darkness.
“Shout if you need me,” he says, and as he closes the door, I think of Kate, slamming her fists on the table when Dad was having a go at Mum. It’s just not right, I tell myself, as I sink back into the chair. How can she be dead and I still be here? She was the strong one, the fighter. It’s just not possible. He must be wrong.
I need a drink.
I put my hand down the side of the chair and feel about in the darkness for the bottle of wine I hid last night. My hand rests on it and I pull it up. I don’t have a glass but I don’t need one. Unscrewing the top, I take a long glug. It’s warm and slightly sour but it will do the trick. I just need to numb the pain in the pit of my stomach.
IT’S DARK OUTSIDE now. I have no idea what time it is. I’ve finished the wine and I would kill for another bottle. Paul has come in a couple of times to ask me if I want a cup of tea. I’ve told him I need a proper drink but he won’t listen to me. Just keeps saying I’m in shock.
Is that what this is?
As I sit here in the dark, all I can think about is Kate. I see her with Mum, standing at the end of my bed the day Hannah was born. Mum was making a fuss about me getting the latch right and making sure I burped Hannah properly but Kate just stood there staring at the baby. It was like she was looking at some strange creature. I knew exactly how she felt because Hannah might as well have been an alien for all I knew about babies. I was just a child myself.
Eventually I told her to sit down and while Mum went to get some tea the two of us watched Hannah as she slept in the plastic crib. At one point I turned to Kate and said: “What do I do with it?” And she looked at me for a moment, then shrugged and said, “Don’t ask me.” And we both burst out laughing. When Mum came back in she asked what was so funny but we were too cracked up to answer her.
Three weeks later she left for university and never came back. That moment in the hospital was one of the few times we bonded. For as long as I can remember Kate had been the better sister, the clever one, the brave one, and I could never live up to her, but for a few moments as we sat looking at Hannah sleeping in her crib we were just a pair of giggly, clueless schoolgirls.
Then I remember something. She phoned me. It was just before she left for Syria. I try to piece together what was said but I can only recall snippets. I must’ve been drunk. I can remember she said she was at the station—or was it the airport? I vaguely remember being angry at her for leaving again. I should have just bloody listened. What was she trying to say to me? It’s no use. I can’t remember.
And now she’s gone and I will never hear her voice again.
As I blink away the memory of the phone call my thoughts turn to Hannah. I wonder where she is. If only she would get in touch. She needs to know about her gran and now her aunt Kate. Why does she have to be so stubborn? And then I hear her voice in my head. Just let me go, Mum. I’m pulling at her wrist, begging her to get back in the house. And then it all goes black and I will myself to remember what happened next but I can’t. I just can’t.
“Sally.”
I look up. He’s standing at the door in his dressing gown.
“Come on, love, it’s gone midnight,” he says. “Why don’t you come up to bed?”
“I’m not tired,” I say.
“You’ve been in that chair all day,” he says. He steps into the room and goes to turn the lamp on.
“Leave it,” I shout, anger and grief and resentment rising up my gullet. “Just bloody leave it, will you?”
He pauses with the cord from the lamp in his hand.
“Sitting here like this, not moving, not speaking, is not going to bring Kate back,” he says, letting the cord drop. “If you shut me out it’s only going to make things worse. We can talk about it. I’m here for you, Sally. I’m here to listen.”
“I have nothing to say to you,” I reply.
His voice is setting my nerves right on edge. I need to be alone with my memories of Kate. I need to make sense of all of this but him coming in all the time just distracts me and makes me feel like I can’t breathe.
“You’ll regret it in the morning,” he says. “If you sleep in that chair you’ll be stiff all over.”
“Well, that’s up to me, isn’t it?” I say. “Now, please just go to bed and leave me be.”
As he closes the door my skin prickles. I need another drink. I wait for a few minutes, then get up out of the chair and creep through the living room and into the hallway. I pause by the cupboard underneath the stairs. There’s no sound of Paul; he must be in bed. I carefully open the cupboard door and reach my hand inside. The bottles are still there where I left them a few days ago. My secret stash. It’s the perfect hiding place. Paul never goes near this cupboard. He thinks it’s full of junk and old clothes. I carefully close the door and slip back into the conservatory.
I sink into the chair clutching the bottle to my chest. Just one glass, I tell myself, one glass to calm my nerves. But as I unscrew the lid I know that will never be enough.
29
I wake up in an empty bed. My back is aching and I pull the bedclothes around my shoulders but sleep won’t come. I open my eyes and lie still for a moment. The air feels different. Something happened before I went to sleep, something horrible. And then I remember. The news. Paul’s face. It is real. I am alive and my sister is dead.
“Paul!” I shout. “Paul, are you there?”
There is no reply and I climb out of the bed. The clothes I was wearing yesterday are neatly folded across the back of the chair by the window. Paul must have carried me upstairs in the middle of the night and got me into my pajamas but I can’t remember any of it.
“Paul!” I shout again, but there is still no answer.
I put on my dressing gown and go downstairs to find him.
He’s left a note on the kitchen table saying that he’s been called into work but will be back as soon as he can.
I put the note in the bin and walk out of the kitchen feeling a little clearer. When Paul is here I feel suffocated and my brain won’t function. At least with him out of the house I can think straight.
I go straight to the cupboard under the stairs and open the door. I need a drink, just one, to ease the aching in my chest. I put my hand inside. There’s nothing but old coats and boxes. Turning on the light, I push aside the junk and feel around for the bottles. But there is nothing. I step farther inside and get down on my hands and knees. Where the hell are they? I put six bottles in here two days ago. There should be four left. Where have they gone? My mouth goes dry and my heart starts to pound as I search frantically through old shoeboxes and moth-eaten jackets. Then I see it, a yellow Post-it note stuck to the floor where the bottles had been.
I rip it off, my hands shaking with anger.
“It’s not worth it, Sally,” he has
written. “We can get through this together . . . without the booze. I love you xxx.”
The fucking idiot. He’s got rid of my wine. I run back into the kitchen and start pulling open cupboards and drawers. Where’s he hidden it? I can’t deal with this without a drink. It’s too much, too huge.
I go into the conservatory and look behind the sofa, behind the cushions, screaming with frustration as I go. Then as I get to the chair by the window something outside catches my eye. The recycling box, ready for tomorrow morning’s collection, is sitting on the patio with four empty wine bottles in it. He’s poured it down the sink. I don’t believe it.
I slam my fists against the window. The stupid, stupid man. Why would he do that? He’s just making everything worse.
There is no way I can get through this day without a drink so I’ll just have to go and get some more. “Didn’t think of that, did he?” I mutter to myself as I take off my dressing gown and throw it on the floor. What was the point of pouring my wine down the fucking sink when I can just go out and buy more? I’m a grown woman and he treats me like some stupid kid. Sod him.
I find my oversized green puffa coat hanging on the hook in the hallway and put it on over my pajamas. Hopefully no one will notice, I think, as I dig out my old trainers from the shoe rack, but as I bend down to put them on I catch sight of myself in the hall mirror. My eyes are bloodshot and it’s been days since I last washed. My hair is limp and greasy; my skin a sickly yellow. Jesus, I think to myself, as I step away from the mirror. What must Kate have thought when she saw me? She was always immaculately turned out. Ever since she was a kid she had been fussy about her appearance. Everything had to be just so. And she was so slim and pretty. I could never compete.
I try not to think about her as I reach into my coat pocket and pull out a pair of sunglasses. It’s an overcast day and I’ll look silly but better that than scaring people to death.
The streets are deserted as I set off. Thankfully. I have no idea what time it is or what day. All I can see in front of me is a bottle of cold white wine and all I can feel, as I cross the road that leads to the shops, is the absence of it in my bloodstream.
I pull the hood of my coat up around my face as I walk up the narrow path to the Spar. I don’t want anyone to see me. I just want to do what I need to do and get back to the house without any hassle.
As I enter the shop I’m relieved to see that it’s the man working today and not his wife. She always looks at me like I’m dirt when I put the wine bottles on the counter. Bitch. But her old man is pleasant enough and he smiles as I pick up a basket and head to the fridges.
The shop radio is playing “Hey Jude” and I feel a crushing sense of sadness. It’s as if I’ve been punched in the stomach. Kate loved this song when we were kids. She used to change the words to “Hey You” and dance with me around the room. But that was when I was very little, before we started hating each other. I try to block out the song as I put three bottles of Pinot Grigio into the basket and make my way to the counter, but it’s already wormed its way into my head and I know that it will stay there for the rest of the day unless I drink it away.
I put the wine on the counter, making a mental note to myself to find a new hiding place, somewhere Paul will never think to look.
“Sun come out, has it?” says the man, noticing my glasses. He scans the bottles and begins to put them into a flimsy shopping bag.
I nod my head, wishing he would just hurry up.
“Spring is here,” he says with a smile. “Makes it even more poignant, doesn’t it?” He points in the direction of the newspaper rack by the door. “She was from round here, you know.” I follow his gaze and see a mass of headlines:
WIPED OUT
NO SURVIVORS
BOMBED WHILE THEY SLEPT
“Syria,” he says, opening another bag to put the remaining bottles in. “Never ends, does it? I mean, how much can one country take? Those poor people and that poor journalist. She was only in her thirties. They say she’s officially missing but no one could survive that. Have you seen the photos? It was carnage. Makes you think, though, doesn’t it? One minute you’re going about your business, the next, whoosh.”
He clicks his fingers and the noise makes me jump.
I leave the counter and walk across to the newspapers. I take a copy of The Times and look at the picture that is splashed across the front page: a pile of body bags lying in a scorched field. My stomach twists and I drop the paper on the floor. I’m going to throw up.
“That’s £27.36 when you’re ready, love,” says the man as I bend down to pick the paper up. “Are you wanting the newspaper too?”
“No,” I reply, putting it back on the shelf and returning to the counter. I grab the bags and thrust a wedge of twenty-pound notes into the man’s hands, the entire contents of my purse.
“Hang on, love, that’s far too much,” he says. “Come back and get your change.”
But I’m already out of there. Clutching my stomach, I run behind the pizza shop and throw up violently. Afterward I put my hand on the wall to steady myself and stand there for a few moments just trying to breathe. Then, wiping my mouth, I head back to the promenade. I have to get home. I have to get away from the man and the newspapers and the Beatles song that is going around and around my head. I have to get home and pour myself a small drink and then it will all be better. I’ll be able to think straight.
Two hours later I’m drunk. Lying on the sofa, I close my eyes while Paul McCartney’s voice flutters through the room.
Just one glass, I’d told myself, but the first glass barely registered so I had a second. That warmed me up and blunted the edges a bit but it still wasn’t enough and as I poured myself a third I remembered I had Kate’s records. It’s got to be here somewhere, I thought, as I rummaged through the tattered sleeves. And then I found it. A twelve-inch copy of the Beatles’ “Hey Jude,” and there on the back of it in black felt-tip was her name: Kate Martha Rafter. I took the record out and gave it a wipe with the back of my sleeve, then, taking a big sip of wine, I put it on my ancient turntable and suddenly she was back. We were two little girls dancing around the living room.
And now, as I lie here on the sofa with the song still playing in my head, I try to picture her but all I can see is a damn body bag.
“Hey you,” I sing to the ghosts in the room. “Dum, dum de dum.”
Slowly, my eyelids grow heavier than the words and everything goes dark.
I wake to a loud bang. I sit up and listen. The thud of heavy feet and a voice, low and muffled, calling my name. I go to stand up but I can’t move. My heart pounds and I can’t get my breath.
The footsteps grow closer.
“Kate?” I whisper. “Is that you?”
I try to get up from the sofa but my legs are so heavy I can barely move.
“Oh, for God’s sake!”
I look up and see him. He’s standing at the door, his face like thunder.
“Sally, why did you do it?” he says as he steps inside. “You know this isn’t the answer.”
“It’s nothing,” I say, flopping back onto the sofa. “Just leave it.”
“Jesus,” he says, picking up the bottle from the floor. “Three bottles of wine in one morning? You’re going to kill yourself.”
He puts them on the table, then comes and sits on the arm of the sofa.
“Drinking’s not going to bring her back,” he says, taking the empty glass from my hands.
“I know that,” I say.
“In fact, it’s just going to make things worse,” he says.
I bury my head in the cushion so I don’t have to listen to him, but I can still hear his voice droning on.
“You’re going to need a clear head to deal with this, Sally,” he says. “To fully come to terms with her death.”
And as I lie here I remember something. One of the headlines from this morning.
“You’re wrong anyway,” I say, sitting up. “About Kate. She�
��s not dead.”
“Oh, Sally, what are you talking about?” He sighs.
“I saw the papers in the shop,” I tell him, pointing my finger in the air. “They said ‘missing’—she’s missing, not dead. I tell you, she’ll turn up right as rain in a couple of days.” I laugh loudly.
He shakes his head and his face looks so smug I want to punch him.
“What? What are you shaking your head for?”
“Sally, listen to me,” he says. “We got a call just now from the Ministry of Defense. They told me that Kate had us down as her next of kin. Sally, they’ve confirmed it. Your sister’s not missing, love, she’s dead. They’re sending her belongings to us.”
I stand up from the sofa, grabbing for something, anything, to hold on to.
“But the papers,” I begin. “They said missing. Why would they say that if it isn’t true?”
“I’m so sorry, Sally.”
Her face fills the room and my head starts to spin with that bloody song. Hey you. I hold out my arm to stop myself from falling but it’s too late and I go crashing into the edge of the coffee table.
30
I shouldn’t be here, I think to myself as I sit on a sterile white bed. Through a gap in the thin green curtain I see disembodied feet passing by, all in such a hurry but none of them stopping at my cubicle. Why won’t anyone come?
The nurses cleaned me up when I arrived; stitched my head and put a monitor on my heart. Paul stayed in the waiting room while they wheeled me into Accident and Emergency. I was relieved. He kept asking me if I was all right. What did he want me to say? Yes, I’m great. I’m deliriously happy. My sister is dead and everything’s fine and dandy.
As more feet pass below the curtain, not stopping, my loneliness intensifies. Everyone I love is gone: my daughter, my sister. I even miss my mother, the cantankerous old cow.
I should be dead too, I think as I place my hand on the jagged stitches that ripple along my forehead like a railway track. There is nothing left for me to live for.
My Sister's Bones Page 19
