What My Sister Knew

by Nina Laurin

  “What do you think you’re doing?”

  Her hand trembles, and she nearly drops the lighter before she manages to snap it shut. The spider disappears somewhere in the tangle of the dead wisteria’s branches, but she’s not watching it anymore. Guilt forms a thick lump in her throat, her face growing hot. Eli stands over her, and as she looks up to meet his gaze, she’s ready to beg him not to tell Mom or Sergio. She’ll do his chores, hand over her allowance. Whatever it takes.

  But when she sees his face, she realizes his expression isn’t anger—it’s lively interest.

  “Where did you get that from?” He reaches for the lighter, and she snatches it away as quickly as she can, knowing full well it won’t be quick enough. They haven’t looked like twins for a while now—he’s taller, stronger, and strangers now assume he’s her older brother. He’s quick enough to catch her and strong enough to wrestle that lighter out of her hand.

  “I found it.”

  “So you stole it. It’s cool, Addie. Jesus, relax.”

  It feels like the last thing she should do.

  “I don’t care where you got it; just don’t set the whole house on fire, okay?” He holds out his hand; the smirk on his lips is deceptive. “Lemme see.”

  She starts to back away but there’s nowhere to back away to. And she’s still crouching so she loses her balance and lands on her behind. Her favorite jeans, the ones with the rhinestones on the back pockets, hit the damp earth.

  “Get away from me!” she snarls.

  “Or what? You’ll tell Mommy?” he sneers. “She’ll take it away, and you know it, and since you’re such a bad liar, she’ll also know it’s stolen, and you’ll be in a ton of trouble.”

  “It’s mine.” She’s ready to cry, and her voice betrays it, trembling treacherously.

  “Yeah, yeah.” Before she can draw a breath, he’s upon her, and without effort, he catches her wrist and twists it. Her hand opens, and the lighter drops into his palm.

  “Wow. Not bad. Might be expensive. If you stole it from someone we know, now’s a good time to tell me.”

  That’s when she lies. She doesn’t know why—the opportunity is there, and it seems like the kind of thing that might make him give the lighter back, or at least make him not rat her out. “It’s Sergio’s,” she says. “It was in his stuff. He thinks he lost it so it’s cool.”

  Her brother’s expression shifts so fast she’s frightened, convinced that he saw right through her lie and that things are about to get worse. But instead, he tosses the lighter back to her with disdain. It traces an arc through the air but she fails to catch it, too stunned to move. It lands on the ground, and she dives for it before Eli can change his mind. She wraps it in the hem of her shirt to wipe off any dirt that may have clung to its perfect, shiny surface.

  “You’re not gonna—”

  “I’m not gonna tell him,” her brother says with a scowl. “God, even when you do have secrets, they’re lame ones.”

  He turns around and storms up the stairs leading to the patio. She hears the tires of her mom’s car on the gravel as it pulls up behind the fence, and she hurriedly puts the lighter back in her pocket. She’s fuming. If you only knew, she finds herself thinking. If anyone only knew the things that go through her mind in the darker hours of the night. What she imagines saying, the things she imagines doing to Leeanne and the other girls, the prettier girls who will have it easy their whole lives because they happened to be born with a different set of genes. How she imagines smashing their faces repeatedly with a brick until lips split and teeth crumble and eyeballs burst.

  She wants to tell him but then she’d also have to tell him that she hates him too, her own brother, her own twin. That she resents him, as if he took something that belonged to her without even realizing it.

  Her whole life, everyone always liked him more, and she took it as the natural order of things. Only recently has she begun asking herself why. Watching him out of the corner of her eye.

  Outside the fence, the car engine stops, and the door slams. Andrea goes to help her mom bring the groceries inside and then starts to put them away in the fridge without being prompted. She focuses on every item, lining them up just so on the shelves, pretending it’s a game of Tetris: egg carton, milk, bologna.

  “What’s with you today?” Cass says, more affectionate than surprised. “You’re never this helpful. Did you do something you’re trying to make up for?”

  Andrea pretends she hasn’t heard, and the whole time, she avoids looking directly into her mother’s face. All evening, she can’t bring herself to meet her gaze. Later, she would wish she had.

  After dinner, when she goes up to her room to finish homework, her brother is already there, sitting still and quiet on her bed.

  “Hey,” he says as she makes a beeline for their shared desk, doing her best to ignore him. Normally, he’d annoy her, throw her stuffed animals at her and then pencils and books. He’d needle her, saying increasingly cruel things until she had no choice but to pay attention. Eli isn’t used to being ignored, and there’s nothing he hates more. But after that first hey, it takes him another five minutes to speak again. She’s had time to lay out her books and notebooks, pen hovering over a new page.

  “Addie,” he says, and something about his voice makes her turn around. His eyes are red, she realizes with confusion. She doesn’t think she’d ever seen him cry before—ever. Not even when they were little kids.

  “I gotta tell you something. Can you keep a secret? A real one?”

  She gives a terse nod, afraid he’ll change his mind.

  “The real reason I stole that money was…I needed it. I’m going to run away.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  “I don’t have anything to say to you,” I tell Figueroa.

  It’s a nightmarish replay of the scene just days ago, except everything is different this time. Cynthia’s lawyer, a prematurely gray man in his late thirties, stands behind me, an ominous presence that doesn’t seem to bother Figueroa in the slightest.

  “You don’t have to say anything. Actually, as your mother’s lawyer has no doubt advised you, it’s better if you don’t.”

  “Why do you hate me so much?” I ask. I’m staring right into her smiling face. Victory looks good on her: It’s as if her skin has smoothed overnight, the fine lines and dry flakes all evened out. Another case untangled, I can practically read in her smug half smile. Another promotion looming. Or almost. The only thing standing between her and her triumph of the ego is this stubborn, ugly girl with her angry pink skin melted like wax.

  Instead of answering, she tilts her head, inspecting me curiously. “I wondered about you from the start, Andrea. And I think I have you figured out.”

  “I seriously doubt that.”

  “The whole spineless thing,” she says, as if she hadn’t heard. “I just wasn’t buying it. Eli Warren killed your mother and stepfather, made up a bunch of lies, disfigured you. And now he murdered another girl. A girl who, under slightly different circumstances, if it hadn’t been for the Boudreaux family in any case, could have been you. A girl who even looks like you, who has a similar name! Why on earth would you continue to protect him? Is blood really that important?”

  I draw a breath to retort but she silences me. It’s probably for the best. “You know, let me tell you something. I’m an adopted child myself,” she says. “My parents were upstanding people. They raised me and my sister to the best of their ability. They gave us values, they provided us with an education, and they taught us how to be good people. And it wasn’t that I never wondered about my birth parents but I figured they had their reasons, right? Well, a few years ago, my birth father tracked me down. Spun some story about wanting to reconnect, the importance of family, and so on. Real tearjerker. Except it didn’t take long for me to realize he owed serious money, something to do with gambling—I don’t remember the details. I dropped him. Never spoke to him again. Perhaps some people would judge me for that
, but in my mind, I did the right thing. I don’t even know what became of him after that.”

  “I know what you’re doing,” I say quietly. “I do it too, with the homeless kids from the shelter. Rapport. I’m supposed to open up to you now, or something?”

  She leans closer, her eyes practically sparkling with glee. “No. I didn’t expect it to be so easy. I simply wanted you to know that I do understand you, Andrea. It’s just that, like with my biological father, I find the whole story a little on the nose.”

  “You don’t have to talk, Andrea,” the lawyer pipes up. I managed to forget he was there.

  “She’s not talking,” Figueroa assures him. “She’s listening.” She turns back to me. “When things seem a little too contrived, a little too convenient, it makes me want to ask questions. Just how much is one girl willing to endure in the name of shared DNA? Unless it’s not him you’re protecting. It’s something else.”

  “Is this what really brings you here?” A feeling of deep calm overcomes me. I think I’m even smiling. “Theories? Wow, you really have time on your hands.”

  “Andrea, please,” Cynthia mutters.

  “Not just theories. I’m looking for justice for a murdered girl. Two girls, as of late.”

  At the mention of Sunny, a lump blocks my throat, all my snappy answers dead and crumbling to dust.

  “Elizabeth Jones. Found strangled in a bathtub, in an apartment with your name.” The words ring out in near-total silence. “Where I will eventually place you at the time of the crime. You don’t have an alibi for that either—I checked. Just like you don’t really have one for Adele Schultz.”

  “I—”

  “Don’t say anything,” the lawyer reminds me. As if I needed reminding.

  “You clocked out of work fifteen minutes early. Your only explanation for the missing time is that car crash.”

  “Are you going to arrest me?”

  “As soon as I can find motive. The reason you’d want Adele silenced.”

  “That’s not what I asked. Am I under arrest?”

  I start to get up, but Cynthia says my name, her hand landing heavily on my shoulder. The strength in her surprises me. I’m forced to lower back down onto the ottoman where I’d been sitting, perched on the edge like a nervous bird.

  “This is absolutely, completely out of bounds,” she thunders. “You come here to make wild accusations against my daughter, and with no basis as far as I can tell. It’s unacceptable. Pray that we don’t decide to take legal action against the police department.”

  “You can do whatever you want once the case is wrapped up,” Figueroa says.

  Childs murmurs something quick and nervous in her ear. She heaves a deep sigh and gets up. “Don’t worry. We’ll be going.”

  Watching her, it occurs to me that she never answered my question. Not really. She skirted around it in such a way that I didn’t realize until it was too late. Why does she hate me?

  As she’s at the door, I catch her eye. If she’s feeling disappointed with the setback, she doesn’t show it. Her look is that of utter contempt.

  I know what you’re really protecting, I read in her gaze. You’re a liar, as bad as your brother. Worse. Because he made a sacrifice, and you only care about yourself.

  Except she has it so, so wrong. I ache to run and stop her from leaving, grab the collar of her sweater and shake her. I didn’t kill them, I want to say. He’s framing me. This was his plan all along—don’t you see?

  Too bad it took me so long to figure it out. And now it might be too late.

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  Since there’s no point in continuing to hide out at Cynthia’s, she called Milton and asked him to come and take me home. I’ve never been so grateful for anything in my entire life.

  I’m upstairs changing out of Leeanne’s sweats when I hear the doorbell, followed by steps, and, finally, his voice. I hurriedly pull my shirt over my head but already the steps are racing up the stairs; then the door swings open, and he bursts into the room. I’m still only halfway into my shirt, and I want to curse him out for not knocking but forget to.

  He stops in the door, breathless. “Andrea,” he says, and I cross the distance between us and return his hug. I want to stay like this forever, in his warm, powerful embrace where nothing can get me. “I was so worried. You didn’t return any of my texts.”

  He could never, ever, understand what I did and what I saw and the lies I told. If I told him, it would put the final nail in the coffin of what we once had. And as much as I realize he’d be better off if I released him, I can’t bring myself to do it—not now. Not here.

  So we go home. I look out the window while he drives back to the town house, like old times. Except instead of the classic rock he loves, the car is filled with silence. The weather is clear and beautiful. Rays of sunlight skewer the car, heating my skin in splotches.

  As soon as he walks through the front door of the town house, he whistles softly. “This place is a mess.”

  “Sorry,” I say. “Housekeeping was pretty far from my mind.”

  “I wasn’t accusing you. I get it.”

  “I know.”

  “You didn’t have to lash out at me. I was only trying to be there for you.”

  I turn and look at him, my eyes drinking in the sight. To have him in here again—it’s almost enough to make me believe everything can still work out. He belongs here. I need to find a way to make him never leave, even if it’s wrong and selfish and only delaying the inevitable.

  “Milton,” I say, taking a step toward him, “shut up.”

  He picks me up and kisses me, hard and passionately. I groan a little into his mouth. I don’t think I ever fully realized how much I missed him—not just his presence by my side, his jokes, all the little things he used to do that drove me nuts. But also this. The purely physical.

  My sex drive seemed to have crawled under a rock to die the day he moved out, and now that he’s back here—even though it’s not permanent, even though it’s just a twist of fate—it’s come back roaring, starved, demanding to be satisfied. I wrap my legs around him but it makes it hard to peel off his shirt. So I pull away and undo his belt buckle.

  My already too-loose jeans, which have become even looser lately, fall without resistance around my ankles, and he lifts me out of them effortlessly, hauling me onto the couch. I kick my way out of my underwear and toss it aside. We don’t even manage to undress all the way, forgetting everything in our mutual hunger.

  It’s over faster than I remember but I don’t mind. I’m sweaty and panting, and so is Milt.

  “Do you want to go upstairs, get into bed?” he murmurs in my ear.

  “No.” I don’t want to move. I spoon against him, my body fitting so perfectly with his. My T-shirt and bra have ridden up and are bunched under my armpits, so his ripped six-pack presses into my back, slightly sticky with sweat. Milt is resolutely unkinky—doing it on the couch is probably among the edgiest things we’ve ever done. He’s very much a bed / dimmed lights / no clothing kind of guy. It took him a while to convince me to have sex without a shirt on. I dug in my heels but he persisted, patient but pigheaded, until I gave in. At first I wanted the lights off, then got used to it, and then began to like it even. My tics, such as crossing my arms to hide some of the burn scars, gradually fell away.

  The idea of having to relearn with a new person didn’t appeal to me. If it didn’t work out with him, I’d decided I was going to be dying alone.

  We do move to the bed eventually. There we muster enough energy for another go. It’s less frenzied this time, Milt as I remember him, taking his time, making sure I come before he does. Afterward, I kick off the blankets, content to bask in our combined body heat.

  “Please don’t push me away again,” he says softly. “I know you needed your space. But all I ever wanted was to help.”

  “I wasn’t pushing you away.” If you only knew.

  The silence lingers but it’s no longer
heavy. Downstairs in the kitchen, the fridge begins to hum. A clock is ticking. My house is once again a home.

  “That money,” he says. It’s like having a bucket of cold water dumped over my head. “That you took. What was it really for?”

  I sit up and pull up my knees. “Why would you ask me that?”

  “A detective came to talk to me. Childs, something like that? He asked questions.”

  I squeeze my eyes shut. My head is starting to spin. How did I manage to forget about that?

  “What did you say?”

  When I open my eyes, he frowns. “What does it matter what I said?”

  I swing my legs over the edge of the bed, reach down, and pick up a sheet from the floor. I tie it around my chest. Finally realizing this is serious, Milt sits up in turn.

  “Just tell me,” I say, making a knot in the sheet. “They asked you questions about me. I need to know what you told them.”

  “Why? What’s going on, Andrea?”

  I face him, furious, and realize that I can’t answer this simple question. Not without lying again.

  He gets out of bed, throws open the closet, and rummages through the scant selection of clothes he left there when he moved out. Finally finding an old, wash-faded pair of boxers, he pulls them on. I notice that he’s thinner than before.

  “I think I have the right to know,” he says. “Tell me what’s going on. Just what do you think is going to happen if you tell me?”

  “You have no idea what you’re even—”

  “Why not? I’m on your side, Andrea. I’m your boyfriend. Your fiancé.”

  “Ex-fiancé.”

  The remark, meant to wound him, only fires him up. “Yeah. No wonder. What’s surprising is that we lasted as long as we did, with you always shutting me out. Afraid to ever tell me what you’re thinking, or feeling. Like if you say the wrong thing, I’ll walk out or something. Is that what you think of me? That I can’t be trusted?”