Once Two Sisters

by Sarah Warburton

  “None of that matters. It’s not who I am now.” I did this to Andrew, made him a single parent twice over. I found a grieving widower and then destroyed his second chance. I want to be Lizzie, loving and loved, and I’ve been working so hard to make her real. Then Zoe fucking killed her. No, Andrew can’t lose Lizzie; he can’t believe she’s gone. How can I convince him to trust me, to believe I’m a good person? I can make myself into the real Lizzie and be everything he and Emma deserve.

  “There’s the station,” Andrew says. “You’ll be safe now.”

  Immediately I feel the absence of the comforting we. I’m alone, even though he’s right beside me.

  I know this loneliness. It’s a cot in a shelter, a tiny room in a houseful of students, a job where the name badge belongs to a stranger. Standing alone in court petitioning for a legal name change, as if that could destroy the person I was. Meals eaten out of a can or over the sink, no kitchen table, no family dinners, no Emma singing in the back seat, no Andrew next to me at night. It’s the year before I met him, one of the worst years of my life.

  We pull into a parking space in silence, and even after Andrew turns the car off, we sit without speaking for a few minutes longer.

  I want to ask him if we have to do this. A part of me wants to fling open my car door and run, vaulting the railing that borders the parking lot and darting through traffic. I could get to our bank, withdraw the max from our account, and disappear all over again. A new location for a few months to establish residency, another name change, and presto—a new life. But the other part just wishes Andrew and Emma would come with me. I could be happy in any city, in any anonymous room, by any name, as long as they were there.

  For the first time I will have to stay and tough it out.

  Andrew must be feeling uncomfortable, even guilty, for bringing me here. He says, “It’s okay. Like I said, this isn’t the FBI. Just make a statement, and it’ll all be okay.”

  * * *

  The station is cold, which maybe shouldn’t be a surprise in October, but in Texas buildings are generally only icy cold in the summer when the AC is blasting. The guy at the front desk doesn’t understand when we tell him we’d like to make a statement.

  “You want to report something?” He looks about my age, late twenties, but he has reading glasses balanced on top of his head and a middle-age spread I wouldn’t have expected on a guy in a police uniform.

  Andrew leans over my shoulder, and the warmth of him feels so comforting. “Is Bob around? My wife and I need to talk to him.”

  “Sheriff’s out of the office. Leave a message?” He grabs a pen and rolls it between his fingers.

  I can imagine how this deputy’s face would change if I started explaining who I am and why I’m really here. I glance at Andrew, longing for him to say, “Oh well, we tried. Let’s go home.” Stupid longing. The kind that never comes true.

  “How about a detective? This is a sensitive matter. I can call Bob and get the okay.” Andrew’s voice is calm, but he’s pulled out his cell phone. Not threatening, just as a contingency. He’s not going to broadcast my lie, but we’re here to Do the Right Thing and we’re not leaving until that objective is accomplished. But that’s not really fair. Andrew believes that if you do the right thing, everything works out. He must believe that making this statement is the first step to putting our life back together.

  The deputy glances at the screen in front of him like he’s wishing for an answer to appear there. I’d like to tell him it won’t take long, that it’s not a big deal, but neither of those things is true. Plus, I feel like a criminal, and anything I said would sound like a lie. Finally, he picks up the phone and hits a button. “Is there someone who can come up here for a minute?”

  We wait, and when a detective finally comes to get us, she isn’t at all what I expected. She is the tallest woman I have ever seen up close, almost as tall as Andrew, and he’s over six feet. She’s lean with flaming red hair, like a comic book superhero. Her long, flowing hair can’t be regulation. I glance at Andrew to see if he is paying her too much attention, but he looks the way he always does. Calm. I don’t know if I even have the right to wonder who he looks at anymore.

  “I’m Detective Valdez.” She reaches out to me first, maybe trying to put me at ease. Maybe because I look guilty. Her handshake is cool and firm. “I understand you want to make some kind of statement?”

  I am tongue-tied. I don’t want to tell this strong, confident woman that I’m a liar and a loser. And like the weakling I am right now, I let Andrew answer for me.

  “Can we speak in private?”

  Detective Valdez doesn’t miss a beat. Her face is as impassive as if this happened every day. “Of course. Follow me.”

  We follow her through the security door and down an anonymous white hallway. She leads us into a small room with a table and four chairs, an interview room like I’ve seen on television. Very minimal. She leaves the door open, but my heart is already racing.

  Before she can ask me anything, before Andrew can start laying out my case, I blurt out, “I didn’t do anything. Someone’s trying to frame me.”

  Despite her unreadable expression, I think I can see skepticism in Detective Valdez’s eyes. I keep talking, trying to convince her, before she even knows what’s going on. “I’ve been here in Texas, but my sister is missing. And they think—”

  Andrew breaks in. “Ava Hallett. Her sister is Ava Hallett. We were on our way to the station when we heard on the radio that Lizzie … Zoe is a suspect.”

  I flinch, and Detective Valdez’s sharp gaze misses nothing. What did it cost my husband to make that admission? I want to take Andrew’s hand, but I’m afraid he’ll pull away.

  Instead we sit down next to each other on one side of the table, and Detective Valdez sits on the other. I tell her who I am, how long I’ve been living as Lizzie, about Andrew and Emma and my normal life. “When I heard on the news that Ava was missing, I tried to call my parents, but they didn’t pick up.”

  Andrew leans across the table, and he’s so sincere, with his open face and clear eyes. He’s the believable one, the trustworthy one. I desperately want to think he believes in my innocence. But why would he? It’s far more likely he’s just trying to keep me out of jail. “There is no way Zoe could have been involved. She was here with Emma.”

  Detective Valdez doesn’t look like a woman who needs a man to give her an alibi. I bet she doesn’t have kids at home or a pet. She looks completely sure of who she is. Sitting across the table from her makes me feel small and pale. Impatiently she swats a lock of red hair away from her face. “Is there anything else you want to tell me now?”

  Now? That sounds like we’ll go over everything again, and she’ll poke holes in my story and tear it all apart. If she looks for proof I’m guilty, I know what she’ll find. I pull out my phone. “Someone hacked my email, my old email. I haven’t used it in years, but someone sent hate mail to Ava from it. And I got texts here.” I set my phone on the table, happy now to have it out of my hands. I can’t help feeling like it’s been infected and just holding it made me vulnerable.

  “Can you trace them?” Andrew asks.

  “And I got a call from my friend’s phone, but it wasn’t her. It was a threat. Someone told me to run. They knew my real name. I mean, my old one.”

  Detective Valdez pulls out a pair of thin plastic gloves and puts them on before examining the phone. “Was the voice a man or a woman?” she asks.

  That harsh whisper sounds in my memory. “I couldn’t tell.”

  She nods. “Okay. We can certainly examine this, but I’ll need you to fill out some paperwork to give us permission.”

  Doubt floods me again. I’m being stupid. What if handing over my phone seals my doom? If there are weird text messages on there, what else will they find?

  And how soon before they pin Ava’s disappearance on me?

  CHAPTER

  5

  SO, DETECTIVE VALDEZ and the
lead investigator decide I need to travel back to Virginia. I never intended to go back to my old life with my new identity, and I worry I’ll be carried back in time, away from Andrew and Emma. Law enforcement has coordinated with my parents, and all my worst nightmares—my mom and dad, Glenn, and my past as Zoe—are waiting for me in the Arlington Police Department.

  We decided that I would go ahead on Andrew’s extra air miles, and that he and Emma might follow on Friday for a long weekend. “We can meet your parents,” Andrew said. Maybe that means he does want to stay with me. Maybe that means he’s checking my story.

  I can’t forget the whispered conversation he and I had at the police station. “What is it with your parents? Are they the reason you disappeared? Did they hurt you?”

  “No!” Maybe my denial was a little too loud, because the deputy at the reception desk glanced up at us. “No,” I repeated more softly. “Like I told you, it was Ava. She stole my life. I just didn’t want her to know about you and Emma, how happy we are. She’d want to wreck it.”

  “Let’s compromise,” he offered. “You go first, we’ll follow for a long weekend; then if you don’t need us, we’ll stop by my dad’s place on the way back.”

  “What about work?”

  He gave me a look that said Are you kidding me? It was true. He had about a million years of vacation saved up. And about two million air miles.

  Now he and Detective Valdez have taken me to the airport, right up to the security checkpoint. She’s going to escort me all the way to the gate. I wish Andrew didn’t have to leave me alone with her.

  Andrew hugs me fiercely, but kisses the top of my head. “We’ll sort it all out.” I can’t tell which of us he’s trying to convince. The problem with a good guy who specializes in logistics is that sometimes he pushes his feelings way, way down to deal with a situation in progress, and only later do you find out what was really going on in his heart. Maybe after I’ve left, he’ll realize he can get by without me. That life would be easier, Emma would be safer. What if absence doesn’t make the heart grow fonder? What if it makes the heart forget?

  Detective Valdez goes around security in the fast track, but I’m stuck in a line of people pulling laptops out of bags and tossing water bottles in the trash. My “overhead approved” wheelie suitcase and everyday shoulder bag are easy to maneuver, but the process is still tedious. We’re fed through the massive scanner, and as I stand there in my socked feet with my hands raised over my head, I wish this machine could see all the way through me. See that I am innocent.

  Once I have my shoes back on, my suitcase in hand, and my bag on my shoulder, Detective Valdez and I head for the gate. We pass a bookstore, the kind disappearing everywhere except in airports. There, right in the front display, is Ava’s newest book, Bloody Heart, Wild Woods, the one the book club is discussing without me tonight. Provided they’re not just discussing me.

  Am I in this novel too?

  Someone clearly knows where I have been living, who I have become. Maybe Ava staged her own disappearance; maybe she is trying to draw me into a game. Maybe I need to read this book for myself.

  Detective Valdez says, “You want to get a bottle of water or something? Go ahead.” She pulls out her phone and waits by the entrance of the store.

  Hoping no one will recognize me, I sidle up to the display. The cover features a tangle of glossy dark-green leaves overlaid with deep-red letters in a gothic script. Bloody Heart, Wild Woods.

  Quickly I pluck one from the middle rack and scurry to the register, sandwiching the book between a Vanity Fair with Colin Firth on the cover and a Better Homes and Gardens special edition on organization. I wait impatiently behind a man in a tweed sport coat who keeps patting his pockets, looking for change.

  Finally, it’s my turn.

  As the woman behind the register asks, “Anything else, hon?” I add a pack of gum to the pile. She doesn’t raise her head as she rings it up. “Need a bag?”

  Mutely, I nod. As I make my escape, I feel like everyone in the little store is hyperaware of me, knows who I am. It doesn’t help that I’m meeting up with a detective. Even in plain clothes, she’s striking, and I feel like her posture and the slight bulge of her gun under her blazer scream law enforcement guarding dangerous criminal.

  When we reach the gate—ten minutes before boarding—the only empty seats directly face the television tuned to CNN. A reporter describes dangerous avalanches in Nevada, oblivious to the news crawl beneath her announcing “mystery writer still missing” and “authorities report her sister has been located and will be assisting the investigation.”

  I slump down, my face hot. At least there are no pictures this time. And I’ve been changed from a “person of interest” to “assisting the investigation.” Probably they just want to make sure I don’t run away again.

  Then I realize my cell phone is still back at the sheriff’s office. My first instinct is to text Andrew and ask him to pick it up. Dumbass. It’s like flipping the light switch over and over when the power goes out. I glance at Detective Valdez, her long legs stretched out in front of her while she watches the news.

  I should buy a new one from the electronics kiosk, but an announcement is blaring overhead. My flight is boarding.

  On the plane, I slip my suitcase into the overhead bin and settle in the relative privacy of a window seat with the gracious luxury of an empty seat beside me. Once my shoulder bag’s under the seat in front of me, I open the book. If I had my cell phone, I would text Felicia to tell her I’ve caved, I’m reading it after all. Then I realize that creepy stalker either took her phone or spoofed her number when he contacted me in the parking lot. She might not even know I couldn’t watch Sam. Shit. Nooo. One more person I let down.

  I lean my head against the cool window and read the opening quotes and the dedication, the places where Ava always embeds her initial clues:

  The two children were bonded so deeply that they never went out into the world without holding hands tightly one with the other, and when Snow-white said: “Never shall we two part,” Rose-red answered: “Not heaven nor hell nor death itself will separate me from you,” and their mother vowed: “You two are as one. What one has belongs just as fully to the other.”

  To the man in the forest. Through snares and thorns and beasts, may our story wend its way to happily-ever-after.

  Not what I expected. Sure, the quote is about two sisters, but who is the man in the forest? Glenn? I can’t see Ava wanting the two of us to share him. And I actually don’t know much about their life together now. When I was with Glenn, he wasn’t into hiking or camping or the outdoors. He was at the U.S. Naval War College for a few months, doing what he referred to as “specialized training.” Once he was back with Ava, any internet search I did on him came up empty. In Northern Virginia, that usually means someone works “for the government.”

  I’m not a conspiracy theorist—anyone could hack emails and track me down—but if Glenn’s working for the government, he’s probably the one framing me. That stings in a familiar way. Bet he blamed our entire affair on me too. Either he knows I’m innocent because he’s the bad guy and he’s setting me up, or he’s innocent but he thinks I’m guilty. I’ll step off the plane and right into my role as scapegoat.

  Ava is a good writer, and I really want to lose myself in a story. Even this one. I turn the page and let the words wash over me.

  Ava’s book opens with a little girl lost in the woods. She wanders alone, hearing the crackling of branches and the rustling of squirrels. Then she comes upon a little house. Ava has written, “No candy lined the front path, the fence was not made of peppermint sticks. The clouded windows were aged glass, not sugar panes, and the bricks were not mortared with icing. Nonetheless, it might have been a fairy-tale house, because once upon a time, when the little girl entered it, the darkness took and ate her, and she was never heard from again.”

  Creepy. Much creepier than I remember Ava’s books being. And thinking of Ava
, maybe really missing, maybe afraid and alone in the dark, makes me shiver. I flip the page quickly, as though I might find the answers to her real-life disappearance in this made-up story.

  The next chapter focuses on a woman who has moved into a little house in the woods, and we—the readers—know it is the same house. Is she the darkness who took the little girl? Is she the little girl all grown up? Or is she the one who will unravel the mystery of the past?

  I have to keep reading to find out.

  CHAPTER

  6

  AVA

  I’M SLEEPING WITH my cheek on my writing desk, but around me the world’s in motion, blowing like the wind through branches. My mind struggles to remember why I’m here, but when I open my eyes, I’m still in the dream. A man in a scarlet jacket and trousers the spring green of new leaves stands in the doorway of my study. “Won’t you come and dance?” He holds out a hand in invitation, but a slender black asp coils around his fingers, its scales flashing. His thin lips twist in a smile. “Your sister wasn’t afraid to come to the Goblin Fair.” In the lenses of his round glasses, I see Zoe’s reflection, her eyes wide with accusation. Then he tosses the snake right in my face.

  With a cry, I regain consciousness, but this isn’t the reality I expect—my own home or even a hospital—no, I’m lying on a vibrating metal floor with my arms pulled taut behind me. The muscles of my biceps feel the strain. My feet are bound to each other, and I can feel something thin cutting into my ankles. There’s enough light to make out where I am, the back of a moving van. Without my hands to steady myself, I’m being jolted as we rattle and bang along.

  The last thing I remember is working in my study, lost in a world of my own making. Writing, telling stories, that’s who I am, what I do, and my success hasn’t just fallen into my lap. Maybe people like Zoe see the publicity shots and the interviews and the movie premieres, but no one sees all the times I shut the study door, all the times I can’t hear what other people are saying because of the story flowing through my mind, all the times the words are a wall between me and my actual life.