Her Sister's Lie

by Debbie Howells

  April 15, 2007

  How many falls until you fly, Mother? How many pills before you slip the chains of your tormented existence forever?

  You were gone all day yesterday. You didn’t tell us where you were going. Do you know how worried I was that something had happened to you? When you came back, I asked you where you’d been. You gazed into the distance and said, “Look how the light catches the raindrops.”

  You, the eternal dreamer, living in your fantasy world, shot my own dreams down in flames. I wasn’t allowed them. I had everything I needed. Where did that come from, Mother? That need to control? To cut me down the moment I stepped beyond what you wanted for me? Was that what your parents did to you?

  Dreams are lifeblood, Mother. You, more than anyone, should know that. How else do you get through the grittiest times to find the most brilliant moments? You had dreams, once, that went beyond the cracked walls of this cottage, the damaged souls you draw here. Tangible, so that you could feel them like snowflakes or a butterfly’s wings, against your cheek. Aren’t you terrified you’ve lost them forever?

  I found a photo earlier, of you and me and Jude. In the photograph, I’m fine. You can’t see the twisted thoughts running through my head, but I learned from the best. Smile and the world smiles with you, you always said . . . People never question a smiling face, but then most people are blind to what they don’t want to see, even when it’s the truth.

  Truth. Oh, that’s long ago vanished from your little world of magic and parties, where the flowers sparkle and the everyday unfolds like some macabre, distorted fairy tale, where everyone smiles because smiling makes everything OK, even when the smile’s a lie.

  It’s a world where there’s an answer to all your problems. Mother’s cure-all. Not talking—that would be far too uncomfortable. Who needs to talk when there’s a pill, when in a few minutes your problems are so far away you can’t remember them.

  But they wait for you, don’t they, Mother? Those problems? In the cold light of day, they’re back, aren’t they, filling you with pain, haunting your every moment, until you take another pill, banish them again.

  Your disappearing, ever-shrinking world. That’s what I remember most.

  I was shocked at Summer’s depiction of her mother. It was unnecessarily harsh, I couldn’t help thinking. I’d always admired the side of Nina that was able to smile in the face of adversity, but Summer clearly hadn’t seen it like that.

  Then, for the first time, I tried to imagine life through Summer’s eyes, seeing the cottage, the garden, the miles of woods. I’d always thought Nina had done her best to do what was right for her children. But somewhere inside, I knew there were things that shouldn’t have happened, things that I could have prevented if I’d tried.

  There was no point going over it now. It was too late. Putting that letter away, I unfolded the next.

  June 2, 2007

  Dear Mother,

  Do you know how much I want to talk to you? How much it would mean if you listened to me? But it’s always the same when it’s about something you don’t want to hear. You shut down and turn away, with a random observation about the persistence of the rain or the unseasonal migration of birds that makes you look past me at something I can’t see. Do you know how it feels when your own mother won’t listen to what you want to tell her? I wish I could let myself believe you were thinking of me, just once. But you don’t think of anyone but yourself.

  Mother, do you know how much I wish things could have been different and that you were happier? I’m not talking about the stupid, plastic smile you plaster on your face; I mean in the deepest part of you, where it counts. The kind of happiness that radiates out from there and reaches others.

  I know you can’t help what happened to you and Hannah. I know you’re trying to do your best. But it sucks. I don’t want to live under the radar forever.

  It’s your dream. It isn’t mine. It isn’t freedom.

  There’s no future.

  Take away my chains, Mother.

  Set me free.

  Let me fly.

  As I read, I could hear Nina’s secrets unraveling, but I was compelled to go on, wondering what Nina had told Summer about our own childhoods. My heart sank as I realized the likelihood was that Abe had read these too. He must have. Why else would he have kept them? Putting the letter down, I picked up the next. This time as I read, I felt my skin prickle.

  June 23, 2007

  When are you going to tell the truth, Mother? You want to take your secrets to your grave, don’t you? But it won’t work. I won’t let you. Don’t you think people deserve to know what happened all those years back? That blood is thicker than blood? Oh, but of course, that won’t have crossed your mind. As always, you’re thinking about you or Hannah, not about Abe.

  It’s too late for me and Jude. We’re only nine and fourteen, the fucked-up children of a fucked-up mother with fucked-up parents. Polluted, with your fucked-upedness running through our veins. If there’s a shred of decency left in you, don’t do it to Abe. Give him what you didn’t give us. Freedom to have a life, not to run wild as we did, but the kind that begins with an education, so that he can be part of the world, not forever hiding from it.

  One day, you’ll have to tell him what you’ve been keeping from him. Can you do that? Be brutally, heartbreakingly, self-sabotagingly honest? Take the hit yourself, in the name of truth? But this time, you won’t be able to run from it, the way you always run from things, pretending they didn’t happen.

  Bury the lie.

  Because here’s the thing. If you don’t tell him, I will.

  It was dated a week before Summer died. As I put the letter down, I felt sick. In the wrong hands, this letter could make it look as though Nina wanted her daughter out of the way.

  I needed to know exactly what Summer had found out. It was possible she’d been bluffing, desperate to get her mother to listen to her, but that last letter had an almost threatening tone to it. What had she known? The next was dated earlier in the year.

  April 16, 2007

  Dear Mother,

  You are your own devil and you make this world your own hell.

  Now, Mother, let’s talk about THAT NIGHT.

  The biggest lie of all the lies.

  But you don’t remember, do you?

  You don’t remember me going to you, telling you that Lenny had come into my room and got into bed with me. You liked Lenny, didn’t you? Gazed at me blankly when I told you. I remember your reply. But Lenny wouldn’t do that.

  But Lenny didn’t like mad old, sad old addicts like you. Lenny liked girls, Mother. I was the only reason he was in your cottage.

  Three questions:

  Why would I lie to you?

  Why did you believe Lenny?

  When Sam heard what happened to me, why did you lie to him too?

  Sam, who wanted to call the police, to put an end to what Lenny had done more than once. You didn’t want the police called, did you? I know what you told Sam, because he told me.

  Summer lied.

  But a lie isn’t always a lie, is it, Mother? For so many reasons—remember?

  THAT NIGHT . . . Lenny didn’t mean it, you told me. Of course he didn’t!!! Your outrage when I told you what he’d done to me.

  It was a misunderstanding, wasn’t it, Mother? That was all. Sexual abuse trivialized, swept under the carpet with everything else you can’t bear to live with.

  Here’s a fact for you, Mother.

  Lenny raped me. And you didn’t believe me.

  Your daughter,

  Summer

  I was shocked. How hadn’t I known about this? I had a faint memory of Lenny, a skinny man who’d hung around Nina’s for a while. He’d been odd, but I found it hard to believe he’d done that to Summer, yet I couldn’t imagine why she’d have made it up.

  Not wanting to risk Abe knowing I’d had the letters, I was carefully keeping them in exactly the same order I’d found them. But it was
later than I thought. I glanced at my watch, suddenly remembering the doctor’s appointment, reluctantly reassembling the letters, torn between keeping them and returning them to Abe’s room.

  In the end, I decided to put them back, still hoping Abe didn’t know I’d found them. There were a couple I had yet to read, and I was aware that I needed to know what else was in them, what Abe knew. I suspected what they were leading toward. If I didn’t have to wait at the surgery, I’d have time to carry on when I got home.

  Locking the house, I walked down the path toward my car. I was still deep in thought as I drove down the road toward the village. Then all at once, I saw the dark-haired man who’d known my name, walking up the road toward me. Fear shot through me. When he saw me, he stepped into the middle of the road, holding out his arms as if flagging me down.

  Logic had long deserted me. Without knowing where it had come from, I was overwhelmed by a sense of danger. I considered going into reverse, then running for the safety of the house, where I’d call the police. But what if he caught up with me before I got there? I braked for a moment, while he slowly walked up the road toward me, his eyes not leaving my face. My next action was involuntary rather than conscious; I just knew I had to get away from him.

  Slamming my foot hard down on the accelerator, I drove at him, holding my course, waiting for him to move, but he stood his ground. At the last minute, he stepped aside, but I’d already swerved around him onto the verge and into the hedge.

  Almost losing control, I managed to pull away. Then somehow I was past him, my hands clammy on the steering wheel, my heart hammering in my chest. As I glanced in my rearview mirror, I could see him standing there, watching me drive away. For a moment, I even thought he was laughing at me. Putting my foot down, I felt the rear wheels slide out of my control, only just managing to straighten them, still driving too fast when I reached the road. Without stopping, I turned right, completely misjudging the speed of the van coming toward me.

  Braking hard, I was horrified as I felt my wheels lock. Then there was a sickening crunch at the same time as my head hit something and pain shot through my body. It was the last thing I remembered.

  * * *

  I had no way of knowing how much time had passed when I came to with the muffled sound of voices all around me. Slowly, I became aware that I was in my car. I tried to move, but I felt a hand pressing me down, holding me still, heard an unfamiliar voice. “Don’t move. You’ve been in an accident. An ambulance is on its way.”

  Accident? Then it came back to me. I’d been driving away from that man. Oh God, what if he found me now? I turned my head, trying to talk.

  “Someone was after me . . .” But my words were lost in the noise around me.

  “Try not to talk . . . You mustn’t worry. You’re going to be fine.” This time I registered it was a woman’s voice.

  I tried again. “The man . . .” I knew what I wanted to say, but I couldn’t form the words. In the distance, I heard a siren. Then, as I opened my eyes, an impossible face swam into focus, a face that I knew couldn’t be here. It was the face of a ghost, staring into mine. That was when I knew I was losing it. I tried to scream, but my voice was mute, silent. I felt myself drifting away, and everything around me faded to nothing.

  15

  Afterward, I had no memory of the paramedics arriving or of being lifted into the ambulance and driven at top speed to the hospital. I don’t know how many hours passed before I regained consciousness. In my hospital bed, left alone, I tried to piece together the disjointed fragments of what I remembered. I’d been driving. Too fast, I knew that. I remembered a sense of fear. I’d been trying to get away from someone. Suddenly, I saw a replay of the dark-haired stranger, standing in the middle of the road, blocking it, of him laughing at me as I scraped past him and into the hedge, driving away too fast onto the main road, straight into the oncoming traffic. Then I thought of the man again, and it was as if I was caught in a nightmare. What if he’d gone to the house? What if Abe was there alone? A sense of panic rose in me. Reaching for the buzzer, I pressed it, again and again, until a nurse came hurrying in.

  “My nephew,” I said weakly. “He lives with me. He’s alone. I need my phone.”

  “Don’t worry, it’s locked in your cupboard.” She fished in her pocket for a set of keys, then unlocked the drawer. “How old is he?”

  “He’s fifteen. The police know he’s there.” Would anyone have thought about Abe? I had no way of knowing if either Sergeant Levigne or PC Marsh knew about my accident. My only other hope was that word would have got around the village and maybe someone might have thought to check on Abe.

  She passed me the phone, and I scrolled through the numbers until I found his, filled with relief as it started to ring. But it went to voice mail.

  I looked at the nurse. I’d no idea what to do. “He isn’t answering.”

  “Is there someone you can call? To go around there and check on him?”

  I nodded, thinking of Curtis, finding his number and willing him to answer, but it went to voice mail. I looked at the nurse. “He’s not there.”

  “Is there anyone else?”

  “Erin.” I sank back weakly. “My friend.”

  The nurse nodded. “Why don’t you try her? I’ll come back in a minute.”

  I waited until she was out of earshot, then called Erin. “Erin, it’s Hannah.”

  “Hannah! How are you?” Any trace of the awkwardness between us last time we’d met seemed to have vanished.

  “I’ve had an accident. I’m in the hospital.” My voice wobbled.

  “God, Hannah. What happened? Are you OK?” Erin sounded shocked.

  “Yes. They’re keeping me in overnight. I’m hoping to go home tomorrow.” Tears pricked my eyes. “Erin? This is really important. I don’t know where Abe is. I’ve tried calling him, but he isn’t answering. He should be at the house, but I’ve no way of knowing. Could you go and see if he’s OK? There’s been this man hanging around. He was there this morning, before my accident . . .” I stopped. Suddenly I was shaking.

  “Hannah? Of course I will. But this man . . . if you’re worried about him hanging around, you should call the police. Get someone to go around there, OK?”

  I nodded. “Yes.”

  “Call them, now. As soon as we’ve finished talking. Then call me back.”

  Ending the call, I scrolled down the list of recent calls, finding a number I didn’t recognize. Relief filled me as the call went through to the police station.

  “Hello? Could I speak to Sergeant Levigne?”

  “He’s not here just at the moment. Can I ask who’s calling?”

  “Hannah Roscoe. He came out to see me when my nephew went missing.”

  “One moment.” The phone went silent for a couple of minutes. Then a different voice spoke.

  “Ms. Roscoe? This is PC Marsh. How can I help you?”

  “I’m worried about my nephew. Abe,” I reminded her. “You know the man I told you about? The one who knew my name?”

  “Yes . . .” She sounded hesitant. “Why are you worried, Ms. Roscoe?”

  “I was in an accident. I’m in the hospital. Just before it happened, I saw that man again, on the road that leads to my house. I’m worried that Abe’s there alone. I’ve asked my friend to go and check on him. But if that man’s come back . . . Can you send someone around? Please?” I could hear myself getting hysterical.

  “Calm down, Ms. Roscoe. I’ll go over there now. What’s your friend’s name?”

  “Erin,” I said desperately. “Erin Bailey. But Abe doesn’t know her . . .”

  “Have you tried calling your nephew?” PC Marsh’s voice was calm; calming.

  “Yes. It went to voice mail. I’ll try him again. But I need to know you’re going there.”

  “Call your nephew, Ms. Roscoe. I’ll call you back once I’ve seen him.”

  “Thank you,” I said breathlessly, ending the call and immediately trying Abe again.
>
  This time, he answered.

  “Abe? Is that you? It’s Hannah.”

  “Yeah. Where are you?”

  “I’m in the hospital. I was in an accident. I’m OK . . . It’s a long story . . . Abe, this is important. Have you noticed anyone hanging around? There was a man earlier. Tall, with dark hair. I’ve told the police. They’re coming over . . .”

  “Not the police again.” He sounded angry.

  “I had to, Abe. I called my friend Erin too. She’s coming over. She’s nice. Maybe you can stay with her for a night? Until I’m home?” In the background, I could hear Gibson barking. “Can you feed Gibson?”

  “Yeah. Someone’s at the door.”

  “Make sure it isn’t the man,” I said anxiously. “Don’t let anyone in, Abe. Not unless it’s Erin or the police.”

  “Yeah.” He hung up.

  Forgetting I’d told Erin I’d call her back, I lay in the bed, my eyes drifting upward as the ceiling swam out of focus; there was a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. Nothing felt real. Not the events of earlier, that man, the way he’d been blocking the road, being here in the hospital. My car . . . There was only one thing I could do. Pulling myself upright in the bed, I pushed the sheet back and moved my legs to one side, then tentatively stood up. I hadn’t thought how I was going to do it, but I needed to get out of there.

  I was still wearing my clothes. Glancing around, I saw my shoes under the cupboard beside my bed. Pulling them on, I picked up my jacket, slipping my phone into my pocket, making it as far as the door before the nurse came in. She shook her head.

  “You shouldn’t be on your feet, Ms. Roscoe. You had a nasty knock to your head, and you were unconscious for quite a while. The doctor wants to see how you are in the morning. Come on, I’ll help you back to your bed.”

  I stood there, shaking my head. “I’m all right. I want to go home.”

  “How were you planning to get there? Is someone coming for you?”