The Sister Season

by Scott, Jennifer

  She didn’t get to finish, as he reeled around so quickly she never even saw his hand coming. She felt it, though, as it landed across the side of her face so thunderingly hard it knocked her off her feet. She skidded backward on her butt almost into the front room, her head buzzing with shock and surprise. It wasn’t until minutes later that the sting would finally break through the numbness. It wasn’t until half an hour later that the bruising would break through to the top of the skin, a dark mark across her cheekbone that would stay there for weeks.

  She gaped at the retreating back of her father as he trudged up the stairs, as if laying out his daughter had no more slowed him down than stepping on an ant. Her mom appeared at the top of the stairs, peering down at Claire curiously, as if she couldn’t quite figure out why Claire was on the floor.

  “What’s going on?” she asked.

  Without a word, Robert reached out and shoved Elise forward, tipping her down the staircase. Her arms wheeled as she caught herself, just falling down a few steps, on her knees. A door slammed from within the shadows at the top of the steps and then it was just the two of them, mom and daughter, both breathing heavily and staring at each other in embarrassment and surprise.

  After a few moments, Elise pulled herself to standing, one of her shins skinned and bleeding, and walked the final few steps down to where Claire lay.

  “Are you okay?” she asked, her voice soft. She looked over her shoulder as she said it, almost as if she was afraid that he was there listening in.

  Claire nodded. “I’m fine. But . . . I can’t take it anymore, Mom. I can’t do this anymore.”

  Elise nodded. “I know,” was all she said.

  Claire had gotten up and gone to her bedroom, pulled on her swimsuit, and headed straight to the pond, where her face was cooled by the water.

  When she finally climbed out, Bradley was standing there, just like always, his wedding band catching the sun and glinting at her.

  “What happened to your face?” he asked.

  Her fingers automatically reached up and touched her cheekbone. She hadn’t seen it yet, so she didn’t know about the bruise, but it was very tender, so she guessed it was ugly.

  “I . . . ,” she said, but found that she couldn’t finish the sentence. There were no words for the way she felt violated and humiliated. No way to express the desolation she felt, the desperation. She found herself instead racked with sobs. She stood, straight and miserable, her hands at her sides, her face scrunched up and ugly for all the world, for Bradley, to see. The pain that shot through her cheek as it scrunched up made her cry all the harder, and she found that she was at last able to talk, but none of the words were very decipherable or made sense.

  Bradley had closed the space between them, his hands reaching out toward her, bent to look into her face, intent on understanding.

  “He’s . . . monster and . . . hits . . . my heart is . . . miserable . . . it’s assault . . . fucking bastard . . .” Claire was saying, as Bradley rubbed his hands up and down her arms.

  He had closed the space between them, his hands reaching down toward hers. He made quiet soothing noises, saying things like “Uh-huh” and “Of course” and “you’re right” and “I don’t blame you” at all the right times, and after a while, Claire’s crying died down to a soft, miserable sniffling, and it was then that she noticed that she was standing very close to her new brother-in-law. Suddenly she felt very naked—too naked—in her threadbare swimsuit and suddenly his presence no longer seemed like something that couldn’t hurt her sister.

  As if he could feel her about to back away from him, Bradley suddenly pulled her into his chest, still making shushing noises, wrapping his arms around her and petting the back of her hair, trailing his fingers down her shoulder blades.

  She pushed away from him just slightly and looked up, unsure how to handle whatever this was that was going on. “Um, I think—,” she began, but was cut off when Bradley leaned down and kissed her, long and slow, his hands moving from her back to the sides of her face, which he held gently while he stroked her lips with his tongue.

  This was wrong. Claire knew it was wrong. It felt wrong. As cute as she’d once thought he was and as okay as it felt for her to let him look when he wanted to look and as much as she thought that he could just remain her friend and letting him look would cause her sister no harm, she knew that this shouldn’t be happening. And it felt good, kissing him. But she shouldn’t be kissing her sister’s husband just days after they got back from their honeymoon. Push away, her mind told her. Push away and dive back into the pond. Let him leave gracefully.

  “What the fuck? You’re the one?” resounded through the woods instead, and it was Bradley who pulled away first. Claire looked up just in time to see her sister racing back through the tree line toward the house.

  Later, Claire would find out that Bradley had been sleeping with a woman from work. That Maya had found a condom in his ashtray that very day, and then she’d come home to find him kissing her sister, her former bridesmaid, on the banks of the pond. Of course she would put two and two together and assume that the condom belonged to Claire. But she’d put the wrong two together. Claire had tried to convince her, Bradley had tried to convince her, but Maya was so stubborn. She was dead wrong about what had happened between them, but never in ten years had she given Claire the chance to tell her that.

  And now, with their father dead, that day of the slap, and the kiss, and later the scene at the Chuck Wagon, was all coming back to haunt her again. What Bradley had told her last night about Maya’s cancer had made Claire sob just as hard as she had on that day. Her sister had cancer. She could die. And Claire would have wasted the last ten years of their lives in a feud with her. A feud over a fucking misunderstanding.

  And now Maya wouldn’t even stay in the same room with her long enough to let her apologize. To explain.

  She rummaged through her backpack until she found her cell phone, still turned off from her flight six days ago. She thumbed it on and felt it vibrate with message alerts. She didn’t need to look to know who those messages were from.

  After avoiding Michael for weeks, suddenly all she could think was how badly she needed to hear his voice. She typed in his number and hit CALL.

  “Merry Christmas to me,” he said upon answering. “You called.”

  “A day late,” she said, closing her eyes and squeezing out tears that instantly welled in their corners just from hearing his voice. God, she missed him so much.

  “But you called.”

  “I don’t know why, actually.”

  “Does that mean you’re not calling to give me the gift I was hoping for?”

  Claire glanced at the front pocket of her backpack again and tried to swallow. “No,” she said, barely a whisper. “I’m sorry.”

  There was a long pause on his end. “Well,” he said. “You called. That’s a step in the right direction.” And when she didn’t respond, he added, “And might I remind you that it was the humanitarian acts of a certain doctor that allow you to step in any direction at all?”

  Claire choked out a laugh. “That’s desperate. You make it sound like I was carrying my foot into the ER in a grocery sack.”

  “That’s how I remember it,” he said. “I was a genius the way I reattached that foot. A superhero, really.”

  Claire tipped her face to the ceiling, the tears flowing even harder while she laughed. How did he do this? How could someone who made her so happy make her so sad at the same time? “You’re going to love the cape and tights I bought you for Christmas.”

  “You got me a present?”

  Claire blushed. “No, actually. I didn’t.”

  “Ah. Well. One step forward, two steps back. How was the Midwest?”

  “I’m still here, actually. And bad,” Claire said. She swallowed against the pit in her stomach. “I miss you.”r />
  “Do you?” She could practically hear the smile in his voice. She didn’t deserve someone as good, and as patient, as Michael. “Sounds like you got me a present after all, Claire Yancey. I love you.”

  Claire blanched. The “L” word. A conversation killer if there ever was one. She squeezed her eyes tight, hating herself as she let the words fall and die, unanswered. I love you, she said in her head, as she’d done so many times, trying out the words as if they were toxic, dangerous. I love you, I love you, I love you.

  Instead, she said, “I’ve got to go.”

  “Call me again sometime,” he said. So hopeful. So vulnerable. How did he do that? How did he still believe in her, in them?

  “’Bye.” She hung up, unable even to commit to a phone call. If that wasn’t fucked up, she had no idea what was.

  Tomorrow. Tomorrow would be the funeral, and then this would all be over with. She could climb back on the plane and go home. Go sit on the beach. Go swim in privacy. Try to forget that she had a sister. Try to pretend she didn’t care.

  With another grunt, she flopped back onto the bed and once more unzipped the front pocket of her backpack and reached inside. Her hands wrapped around the small velvety box again and she pulled it out. Damn thing.

  Slowly, she opened the box. There it was. Still there. Gleaming dully under her bedroom light. One solid diamond hovering over nine small channel-set diamonds. Beautiful.

  Marriage is where the real fun is . . . Bliss . . .

  She pulled the ring out and once again slipped it onto her finger, as she’d been doing all week. It felt heavy. Oppressive. Exciting. Frightening. Perfect. Terrible.

  She held her hand out and gazed at it from a distance. It didn’t look like her hand. She would never grow into that hand.

  With an exasperated sigh, she yanked the ring off her finger and, as she’d done all week long, placed it back in the box and snapped the box shut. Ridiculous.

  She shoved the ring back into the front pocket of her backpack and used her heels to stuff the whole thing under her bed.

  One more day and she would be out of here.

  Sixteen

  Julia was sitting in the recliner when Claire came into the front room. Her feet were up and she was staring intently at the TV screen, which was set to a football game, the sound muted.

  “This was the last thing he saw,” Julia said, as Claire pulled out the piano bench and sat on it, facing the TV as well. “Weird, huh?” She turned her head and looked at Claire. “What a sad way to go. Alone like that.”

  Claire picked at the skin around her thumbnail. “He made his own bed,” she said, holding herself back from saying any more. Again, the memory of him hitting her, not far from the very piano bench she was currently sitting on, rushed in on her. She pushed it away. She did not need to go there today. Not with that ring still burning a hole in her gut every time she thought about it.

  “I always wanted to ask . . . is it true? What you did?” Julia said.

  “Not the Bradley thing again.”

  Julia shifted, curling one leg up so that the bottom of her foot rested against the calf of her other leg. “No, no . . . At the Chuck Wagon.”

  Claire chuckled, glanced up from her thumb, nodded. “Yeah.”

  Julia laughed out loud. “Holy shit, that must have taken guts!”

  It had. It had taken more guts than Claire had ever known she had. Of course, there was more than just guts involved. Her face still smarted from where he’d hit her. Her heart still ached from Bradley’s kiss. And her stomach still roiled from Maya’s words—“Are you sleeping with her? You’re screwing my sister, aren’t you?”—as they’d caught up with her halfway across the soy field, anger piercing her eyes, nose running from crying.

  Bradley had blubbered and tripped behind Maya, who was screaming obscenities at them both, all the way to her car. Claire had gone into the house. She’d changed out of her swimsuit and crawled into bed, lights off, her hair soaking pond water into her pillow, the shadows of evening creeping up and then over her as she lay there staring at the wall, trying to process all that had happened.

  Had she asked for this? She’d never wanted to hurt her sister. She knew how much Maya adored Bradley. But she’d been letting him watch her, and why? For vanity? Because she liked the attention? How was that not hideously wrong?

  But, God, she’d never meant for him to kiss her. She’d never wanted that.

  After a while, there was a knock at her door, and her mom came in. She thought maybe Elise was limping just slightly, and her leg was bandaged up as if she’d merely cut herself shaving.

  “You going to dinner with us?” her mom had asked.

  “No,” Claire said, sinking deeper under the covers.

  “You sure? He’s calmed down some,” her mom said. “Had a few drinks. I’m sure he’d forgive you.”

  Claire sat up in bed, enraged. “Forgive me? All I wanted to do was borrow the car! That’s it! How does that warrant this?” She gestured toward her cheek when she said that, then pointed at her mom. “I’ll never forgive him. How about that? He can drink all he wants and forgive me all he wants, but I’ll never forgive him. This is the last time he hurts me. As of right now, he might as well be dead for all I care.”

  Elise said nothing. Just bowed her head for a few moments, then looked up again and asked, “You sure about dinner?”

  Claire let out an angry burst of breath and flopped back against her pillow. “Positive.”

  “Well, we’ll be at the Chuck Wagon, then,” Elise said, and slipped out.

  Claire lay in her darkened room for a while after she heard them leave, but she couldn’t rest. How dare he be so magnanimous as to “forgive” her? All the beatings she’d had at that man’s hands . . . all the insults . . . all the horrible days and nights . . . and he had the balls to forgive her? It was more than she could take.

  She jumped up out of bed, threw on her shoes, and called her friend Michelle.

  Half an hour later, Michelle waited in the parking lot of the Chuck Wagon while Claire marched inside.

  They were sitting at a back booth, her father leaning across the aisle to talk to a couple at the table next to them. Their plates were scraped clean, their napkins tossed onto them as if in surrender. Her mom was looking in on the conversation, a smile plastered on her face. But Claire knew the smile was fake. She knew the well-placed laughter her mom let loose every time her father tried to be charming was for show. She knew her mom was beaten down and miserable and had all but given up. God, why didn’t she? Why didn’t she just give up and set them all free?

  Claire walked straight up to their table, her chin held high, despite how small and nervous she felt. She didn’t say anything, and it took a moment for Robert to realize that there was someone standing in front of him, wanting his attention. When he looked up at her, she saw the crinkled edges around his eyes disappear on a dime. Instantly, his face turned hard.

  “I thought you didn’t want to come,” her mom said meekly.

  “We’re done with dinner. You’re too late,” Robert added, over his wife.

  “I don’t want to eat,” Claire said icily, her whole body feeling flushed and on fire as she spoke. She nearly trembled with fear, looking into his face so close. “I just came to tell you that today was the last time you will ever lay your hands on me again, motherfucker.” And with that, she mustered every ounce of reserve she had, pulled back one hand, and smacked him across his cheek so hard her wrist ached for a day afterward. The sound of flesh on flesh echoed throughout the restaurant so loud everyone went quiet. Even the waitress stopped and stared. Even Robert didn’t seem to know quite what to do in the stillness.

  But Claire did. She picked up the half-empty glass of soda sitting on the table in front of her father and chucked it, glass and all, into his lap, then turned and left the restaurant.
She walked slowly, not wanting him to see how terrified she was of what she’d just done, and then hit the front door, and sprinted to Michelle’s car, half laughing, half bawling, all the way to Michelle’s house, where she stayed until she left for California one week later. She’d never spoken to her father again.

  Maya had used Claire’s absence as an opportunity to poison the well against her. Julia had tried to call a few times, always leaving mystified messages—What happened . . . Why did you do this to Maya . . . Why are you breaking up the family—but Claire, too indignant that she should even have to defend herself, never answered, and eventually Julia stopped trying, and it was done.

  Julia laughed, throwing her head back against the recliner, as Claire retold the story about slapping him. Claire couldn’t help it; she laughed too. Never in her wildest dreams would she have thought she would be able to look back on that day, one of the most horrible days of her life, and laugh. Never would she have thought the distance would be great enough, the perspective shifted enough.

  “I’ll bet the old bastard didn’t know what hit him,” Julia said. “Can you imagine?”

  Claire’s laughter dried up. Yes, she could imagine. She could imagine the way her mom held her arm close to her side while following Claire around as Claire packed to leave the farm. She could imagine the way her mom winced when she twisted just right. For years, Claire had held the guilt that her actions had most likely gotten her mom the beating of a lifetime when they’d gotten home that night. She’d never asked Elise for sure if that was what happened. She wasn’t sure if she could handle the remorse if the answer had been yes.

  “Where’s Eli?” Claire asked, eager to change the subject, and proud of herself for using the kid’s name.

  “Outside,” Julia answered. “With the little ones.” She paused for a beat. “You know, I think something happened with him.”

  “What do you mean?” Claire asked.