Home with My Sisters

by Mary Carter

  Brittany and Josh were close to the edge of the water now, a couple of upright humans amidst all those stinky, barking seals. She didn’t know how Hope worked amongst stinky barking dogs all day. Couldn’t be much better than the seals. She could not believe that both of her sisters were now planning on visiting this woman. What would their mother say?

  Stephen finally emerged from the restroom and for a few seconds Faith wondered what he’d been doing in there so long. Not that it was any of her business anymore. She still found him attractive, that was the irony of all this. He’d maintained his athletic body with his daily runs, he didn’t have any horrendous habits, he made great money but was still able to pull off a work-life balance, he moderated his extracurricular activities that didn’t include her like golf and business dinners. As a rule he didn’t come home late. On paper, he was perfect. She was the one who was finally accepting who she was and who she wanted to be with. She was the one driving their family off a cliff. Yet here he was, playing his part. He took one look at Faith and furled his eyebrows in concern. “What’s wrong?”

  He knows you. One look at your face and he knows something is wrong. Would anyone ever know her like that again? A grenade of guilt exploded in Faith. He’d tried so hard to be a good husband, and she’d ruined it all. She hated seeing the pain in his eyes every time he looked at her. And something else. A bit of desperation. He wanted to save this marriage despite the fact that she was in love with someone else. She saw it every time she looked at him. If he hadn’t walked in on her and Charlie in a compromised position, she probably would have never ended the marriage. That made her both sad and guilt-ridden. “Joy is going too. With her new boyfriend. They’re both going to visit that woman.”

  “Okay.” Stephen put his hands in his pockets. “I’m pretty sure I know what’s coming.”

  “I can’t let them go without me.”

  “The Garland Girls Reunion Tour,” Stephen joked. Faith tried to smile, but she didn’t have it in her. Stephen ran his hands through his hair. The fact that he still had a full head of hair was reason enough to try to make the marriage work. What was wrong with her? “We’re supposed to go to my mother’s for Christmas,” she heard Stephen say. “It was going to be our last Christmas together as a family.” The bitterness crept into his voice. There it was. Faith had been waiting for it. She knew anger had to be simmering underneath his polite façade. She certainly couldn’t blame him. Often she’d imagined this from his point of view.

  How would she have reacted if she’d come home to find him on the sofa with another woman? She definitely wouldn’t be taking it as maturely as Stephen appeared to be taking it. They’d agreed not to make any decisions or say anything to the children until after the holidays. They had no idea Charlie even existed. How strange. Was Faith really going to do this? Was she really going to follow her heart? Was that even wise?

  That huge dilemma aside, Faith still didn’t want to spend yet another Christmas with Stephen’s mother, pretending everything was okay. The woman had never really accepted her as a daughter-in-law, and it was going to be even worse when she found out Faith was leaving her precious son, her golden boy. Stephen’s mother had taken Faith in when she was seventeen and pregnant. Saw to it that they married. Helped raise Josh. Made sure Faith finished high school and even went to college. Yet the woman had never loved her. Faith didn’t blame her, but she was tired of pretending. At least this year she wouldn’t have to open yet another pair of socks from her mother-in-law and pretend that it was a fabulous gift. Especially when everyone else did get fabulous gifts. Maybe she was psychic, sensed that one day Faith would cheat on her darling son, and the years of socks had been punishment in advance.

  “We went to your mother’s last year. And the year before that.”

  “Your sisters are welcome to come.”

  “What part of dying grandmother do you not understand?”

  “You never even met the woman.”

  “Actually, I did. We did. We met her twice.” Faith didn’t know she was going to say that until the words came out of her mouth. It was as if a veil lifted and the memory of meeting her a second time came pouring in.

  She was inside a trailer. The smell of whiskey and cigarettes actually hit the back of her throat. She could picture her grandmother standing in the kitchenette with her hard, wrinkled face. A smoker’s voice, low and gravelly. Oh, she remembered her all right. She’d called Hope chubby and pinched Hope’s cheek until she cried out, asked their father when he was going to “shut that thing up” (Joy), and tried to get Faith—who was only eight years old—to run to the store to buy her booze and cigarettes. Her father laughed as if it were a joke, but Faith remembered the look in her grandmother’s eyes. The woman had been deadly serious. And she’d had cash clutched in her hand. Instead, her father went to the store, leaving them alone with that woman. Faith couldn’t even remember her looking at them or talking to them the entire time he was gone. If she had cookies she didn’t place them on a plate in front of them; in fact, it was truly as if they weren’t even in the room. Their grandmother stood staring out one of the windows in the trailer and began talking about their mother. Words Faith didn’t even understand at the time, but she knew they were all bad. When her father came back from the store they left immediately. Once she had her cigarettes and her beer, the rest of them didn’t exist. Nothing about that woman had felt like a grandmother.

  So if she was summoning them to her home now, Faith knew there was a motive, and wanting to make up for lost time, or bequeathing them some generous gift, was not going to be it. Not even close. The truth was—no matter how much she complained about them—she couldn’t let her sisters face that woman alone.

  She had enough guilt over abandoning her sisters. At least that was Hope’s version of what Faith had done to them. To this day there was this hurt, Why-did-you-leave-us? look in Hope’s eyes. What was she supposed to say? She was their sister, not their mother. Yes, she’d taken on that role, but could she really be expected to carry it on forever? Didn’t she have a right to live her life? Besides. It had all happened so fast. One summer. One summer had completely changed the trajectory of her entire life. That magic number seventeen. Seventeen-year-olds shouldn’t hold the power to make life-changing decisions, but that’s what happened when you didn’t have parents. She loved her mother, but Carla Garland could not be called a parent.

  There was so much about Faith’s life that she’d kept hidden from her sisters. Not out of spite, but to protect them. She’d always wished she would have had an older sister to look out after her. Tell her everything would be all right. Back then Hope was so sensitive to change, so clingy, but Joy was independent. Faith knew Joy was going to be all right without her. And Hope was just going to have to learn. Faith didn’t have a choice, she needed to look out for herself for once. It was just one night, one kiss. And it changed everything.

  The barking of seals brought her back to the present. Stephen was watching her. She flushed as if he knew everything she’d been thinking.

  “What?”

  “You three should go,” Stephen said. “My mom will understand.”

  I was already going. You just have to act like it’s your idea. “Thank you.”

  “But you can’t bring Charlie.” He spit out the name with the usual emphasis and sarcasm. “That’s my only rule.”

  My God. Who did he think she was? Why in the world would she want to drag Charlie into this? “You know I wouldn’t do that.”

  “I really don’t,” he said. “Do I?” Just then, as Faith was watching and Stephen was shooting her with another little stinger, Josh turned and looked directly at her. He looks sad. Fifteen didn’t seem to be an age he was enjoying. Was there any way that he knew about Charlie? No, it wasn’t possible. She and Stephen had gone to great lengths not to let on. What was happening to her sweet little boy? He used to be a mama’s boy. Always clinging to her. He was shy, and sweet, and thin and scrawny. He wasn’t
going to be a jock or the leading man. That filled her with pain for him. But he seemed content to be smart and kind. That is, until this year. The change that had come over him was so startling. Usually sullen, and sometimes angry. And then last month she’d actually walked in on him after he’d taken a few test swipes to his wrist with a razor. And although he had sworn up and down he was just goofing around, that maneuver had landed him in weekly psychotherapy. Faith was even more unsure now about splitting up. She loved Charlie, but Josh took priority. Faith couldn’t help but feel like she was being punished somehow. As if she shouldn’t dare to be happy.

  Not that she had gone about it in the right way. But was there a right way to fall in love with someone outside of your marriage? If she had been honest, truly honest with herself, she never should have married Stephen. Was she supposed to just swallow those choices now for the sake of her children? Wouldn’t it be better for them to have a happy mother?

  “It’s hormones,” Stephen said, watching her watch their son. “I was like that too.”

  “Did you try to slit your wrists?” Faith snapped. Oh, she shouldn’t have said that. This wasn’t Stephen’s fault. He was actually handling all of this much better than she was. Be nice, Faith.

  “He said he wasn’t really going to do any serious damage to himself.”

  “And you believe that?”

  “I want to,” Stephen said.

  “It was a cry for help.”

  “And he’s getting help.”

  “Mental illness runs in both of our families.”

  “My family?” Stephen asked.

  “Your mother.” All of Josh’s traits both physical and emotional mirrored Stephen and his side of the family. Except for his eyes. He had her father’s piercing eyes. He’s an old soul, people used to say after looking into her father’s eyes. Josh was an old soul too. And he was hers to protect.

  “Are you sure Josh is better off with the crazies in your family rather than mine?” Stephen asked.

  “Not sure whatsoever,” Faith said.

  “So why do this? You never want to spend Christmas with your sisters—”

  “Don’t put words in my mouth.”

  “Hope is always making an effort and you’re always rejecting her.”

  “Wait. Are you trying to get me to stay, or are you trying to get me to go?”

  Stephen sighed. “I don’t know,” he said. Seals barked in the distance. Josh and Brittany began running back to them.

  “No matter what,” Stephen said, “this year just isn’t going to feel like Christmas.”

  Faith was sorry to realize that for once, she wholeheartedly agreed.

  * * *

  Hope and Austin were only half an hour from Leavenworth when Faith’s name lit up the screen of her smartphone. “She’s coming,” Hope said with a grin. Austin turned down the radio as Hope answered.

  “Hi, Faith.”

  “You do know that Christmas is still three weeks away.”

  “Your point is?”

  “Why are you headed there so early?” Faith sounded annoyed. Probably because none of this was her idea and Faith thought she should be the one spearheading everything.

  “I’m on break and Austin generously offered me a ride.” Austin gave a smile and a nod at this. Hope wondered if Faith could hear her smiling through the phone. Her sisters were coming! She was off this early in the season thanks to her Whine and Cheese event, but if she mentioned anything about her work with dogs Faith would roll her eyes. And even though they weren’t video chatting, Hope would still be able to feel that eye roll through the phone. Faith was even less of a dog person than Michael. Hope glanced at the hound. A long piece of drool dangled from his jowl. Hope wiped it off with her sleeve. The dog thanked her by licking her chin. She gently pushed his big face away. Faith was not going to be happy to see the lovable beast. The thought made Hope smile even wider.

  “Austin said there’s room for all of us at the house—kids, husbands, boyfriends.” And dogs. “I guess our grandmother’s late husband was loaded.” She wondered the minute it was out of her mouth if Austin would think she was being callous, but if he did, he didn’t let it show.

  “Joy will be overwhelmed.”

  “That’s not what I meant.” Hope really didn’t want to discuss Joy’s motives for visiting with Austin listening.

  “I remembered meeting her a second time,” Faith said.

  “I don’t even remember the first time,” Hope sulked. Austin glanced over. Hope looked away.

  “She lived in a trailer. Dad went out to buy her cigarettes and we waited for him. She insisted on getting a picture of us before we left.”

  “How come I don’t remember that?”

  “You were only four. We didn’t stay long.”

  “Was Mom there?”

  “No, just us.”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “Just as well.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Prepare yourself. From what I remember she was a nasty old woman. She didn’t care about us at all. Definitely didn’t act like a grandmother.”

  “Are you sure it was her?”

  “Unless Dad introduced some other random, nasty woman living in a trailer as our grandmother. Yes, I’m sure.”

  “I was just asking.” Hope needed to change the subject, get the focus off of her. “I met Joy’s boyfriend.”

  “And?”

  “He was a lot nicer to me than she was.”

  “She likes to hold a grudge.”

  “Oh my God. You do know why she’s mad at me.”

  “I do. But I’m not going to tell you.”

  No one else on earth could make Hope feel so childish than her sisters. Within seconds. It was insane. “You have to tell me!” She hated carrying on like this with Austin in the car. He was whistling softly, looking out at the scenery, pretending he couldn’t hear a word. The dog on the other hand had cocked his head and was staring at the phone like he wanted to eat it. Which he probably did. Hope was pretty sure the beast was part goat. He had eaten a huge chunk of the comforter out of the We Three Kings motel.

  “Who’s going to break the news to Carla?” Faith laid it on thick when she pronounced the name and Hope could imagine her rolling her eyes.

  “Maybe she’ll come too,” Hope said.

  “Dream on.”

  “Does she know why Joy is mad at me?”

  “You have to stop caring.”

  “Why? How?”

  “Because it’s going to turn you into a doormat. Call Carla.” There was a click and Faith was gone. She glanced at Austin. Finally, he met her eyes.

  “Everything all right?”

  “I need to make another call.”

  “No problem.”

  “Can we find a bar first?”

  “A bar?”

  “I have to call my mother. That’s going to require a stiff drink first.”

  “Say no more. We’re almost to Leavenworth. I’ll drop you off in town. There’s a ton of restaurants and bars. I’ll point to some of my faves. I can give you some time to explore on your own, pick you up before we go to Yvette’s?”

  Hope didn’t realize she’d been holding her breath until she let it out. “That sounds perfect.”

  CHAPTER 10

  Austin dropped Hope off at a small tavern that specialized in beer and regret. It was dim and smelled like ale and shoe polish. Flanking the entrance were a couple of plaster figures dressed in Bavarian costumes and holding out a plate with a giant sausage.

  “There are nicer places,” Austin said. “But it’s quiet here.”

  “It’s perfect.”

  “I’ll give you some privacy. Text me when you’re ready.”

  “Are you sure?” she asked.

  “It will give me a chance to do some Christmas shopping,” Austin said with a wink. He was such a nice man. If he liked her grandmother, she couldn’t be as bad as Faith said. Or maybe the years had mellowed her into a n
icer person. Hope was looking forward to meeting her. But first she had to break the news to her mother. No matter how happy Carla seemed, she was still haunted by their father’s disappearance. And Yvette Garland was at the top of the list when it came to whom she blamed. “That woman is keeping him somehow,” she said once, her hair plastered to her forehead by sweat. This was before their mother went on meds. The longer her husband stayed away without contacting her, the more paranoid she became. At some point they just stopped discussing their father. It was too painful.

  There were only a few old men at the bar, so she was able to curl up at a back booth and call her mother. The tavern had free Wi-Fi, so first Hope thoroughly depressed herself by scrolling through Facebook. All her Facebook Friends seemed amped up on Christmas cheer. Posting recipes, and holiday plans, and family pictures, and reindeer already. Twinkling lights, and ugly sweaters, and cat memes. Kissing. Bragging. Cheering. Happy times twelve—as if all her friends were mainlining peppermint-laced steroids. These are my Facebook Friends. These are my Facebook Friends on Christmas. Bah humbug!

  Hope knew Facebook wasn’t real life, but she couldn’t help feeling a twinge of panic whenever someone posted memes about sisters. Everyone, it seemed, cherished their sisters. And it was mutual. Heart emojis, smiling faces, cradle to grave proclamations. Hope was determined to get her sisters to feel the same. To rekindle the bond they once had as children. That couldn’t just disappear, could it? Back then Faith would have wrestled an alligator if it was threatening either Joy or Hope. Probably Joy. Who else would provoke an alligator? They used to fight too. Hope even missed the fighting. You knew you were loved when you made someone so angry they physically wrestled you to the ground. Faith once pummeled Hope for stealing her first McDonald’s French fry. Not the last fry, which may have been forgivable. The first hot, salty one out of the box. Hope was twelve, which meant Faith was sixteen. Hope, of course, had no idea she only had one more year left of living with her sister. They had gone to the beach and then McDonald’s for dinner. Against Faith’s warnings, Hope had decided to order an apple pie instead of a meal, but when she smelled those fries, she had to have one. She reached for Faith’s fries one second, swiped a long one out of the box, and the next thing she knew she was down on the dirty linoleum with Faith on top of her pummeling away, her normally beautiful face swollen with homicidal rage. Joy stood over them with a grin sucking on a strawberry milkshake. You had to really love someone to fly into such a rage you’d kill them over a French fry. God, she missed her sisters.