The Geometry of Sisters

by Luanne Rice

  The shops were decorated with red and green ornaments, strands of white lights. Speakers piped Christmas carols. Gracie suddenly woke up, squawked happily. Carrie felt so glad for her daughter's company. She crouched by the stroller, reaching into the pouch for a bottle.

  Carrie's stomach rumbled. She felt so hungry, wished she had money to buy a sandwich. People jostled past, and she overheard them talking about a math competition, celebrating the winner. She glanced up, just in time to see them enter Andrea's, the restaurant on the corner. The sight was such a shock, she dropped Gracie's bottle in the street as she stood by the plate glass window and stared in.

  Her mother, Beck, and Travis, along with a group of other people, were filling booths inside. There was Aunt Katharine, right there with them. Gracie fussed, wanting her bottle. Maybe the sound of her crying carried, because at that moment, Carrie's mother looked up, met her eyes.

  Carrie stepped out of sight. She felt too raw, too unsure of what to say, what to do. Clusters of students swept along, hurrying to get warm somewhere—the library, their dorm room, a café. Carrie felt herself folded into them, moving with the tide of young people, crying harder than her infant daughter as she felt the distance growing between herself and her mother.

  Maura tore out of the restaurant, into the midst of college students, yelling Carrie's name. Her family and the entire Newport Academy contingent stared through the window, watching her lose it in the middle of Thayer Street. Beck and Travis flew to her side, arms on her elbows, trying to support her. Katharine was right behind them.

  “Did you see?” Maura cried to her kids. “Your sister? She was right here!”

  “Mom, calm down,” Travis said. “All these Brown students— you must have thought one of them …”

  “I couldn't confuse Carrie with anyone,” Maura said, running into the crowd as Katharine took the other side of the street. Maura glanced around, saw college students everywhere. Some were laden with packages—they'd gone Christmas shopping, or been to the post office and received boxes from home. Maura's heart felt crushed; when she'd dreamed of Carrie heading off to college, she'd always imagined making her care packages, filling them with brownies, power bars, protein shakes, bright socks, warm mittens, lip gloss—just little things to let her know she wasn't alone.

  The thought of that, of Carrie being alone—by choice, staying away, not giving Maura the chance to love her, hold her—made Maura's knees go out. She sank down right onto the curb and cried.

  “Mom,” Beck said, putting her arm around her.

  “Honey, I want your sister to come home,” Maura wept.

  “I do too,” Beck said.

  Maura always tried to hold the worst in. She didn't like to let the kids see her this upset. It was Beck's big day, and Maura was ruining it. But Beck stroked her head, pressed her face into Maura's shoulder.

  “I thought I felt her with me,” Beck said.

  “You did? When?” Maura asked.

  “Before the competition,” Beck said. “She helped me win.”

  “Carrie did?” Maura asked, grabbing Beck. “You saw her?”

  “I felt her,” Beck said. “She was with me.”

  Katharine returned, shaking her head. Together they all went back inside the restaurant. The party had been so festive, but now it had a somber tone.

  Stephen made a toast to Beck, congratulated her, said that the next stop would be the Boston nationals. Everyone cheered, and Maura saw Travis clink his glass with his little sister. Maura tried to eat, but all she could do was stare out the big windows, watch all the kids pass by on Thayer Street.

  She had seen her oldest daughter, made eye contact with Carrie. She heard Beck talking to Redmond about Mary and Beatrice, about the ghosts of departed quantities helping her to win, but Maura knew it had been real. Katharine watched Maura carefully, and Maura knew her sister understood exactly how she felt right now, as if the world was really coming to an end.

  That night, back at the academy, she waited for Beck and Travis to go to sleep. Then she bundled up and went outside. The December air was pure and cold; the wind blew her hair and scarf straight back as she walked down the path.

  Walking out toward the seawall, she hesitated, eyes drawn up toward the school's top floor. There were the lights again, the first time she'd seen them in weeks. It was freezing cold, her breath a cloud in the crystal-clear air. The stars burned above as only winter stars can do.

  Maura felt herself pulled toward Blackstone Hall. Just as she'd done that night a month ago, she climbed the graceful, curving marble staircase. When she got to the fourth floor, the heavy lock was unlatched. She pushed the door open and stepped through.

  The pool glowed blue-green, illuminated by lamps below the surface. Steam rose from the water, fogging the tall seaward-facing windows. The rest of the room was dark.

  J.D. was swimming, strong hard strokes, the length of the pool and back. Maura stood still, watching. His body looked as leanly muscled as she remembered. His back rippled with every stroke. She listened to the force of each breath, rhythmic and steady.

  After a while, she saw him slowing down. He'd been swimming the crawl, and now he switched to the breaststroke, his head above water; he stopped, looking at her.

  “I saw Carrie,” Maura said, her voice echoing in the marble room.

  “Where?” he asked, swimming to the pool's side.

  “In Providence,” she said.

  He nodded. He didn't ask if she was sure, didn't say maybe she was mistaken, maybe it was another girl her age. He started toward the lift.

  “We'll call Angus,” he said. “He'll drive us up there right now. We won't leave Providence until we find her. We'll bring her home, Maura.”

  Maura's eyes filled, and she shook her head.

  “No,” she said.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “She doesn't want to come home,” she said.

  “She's lost, Maura,” he said. “She's all by herself, and…”

  Maura shook her head harder. “You don't get it, J.D.,” she said. “Our eyes met—she looked right at me, and saw me looking at her. And she ran away!”

  She sobbed, feeling more pain than she'd ever felt in her life, and crouched down by the pool, curled into herself. Losing Andy, even having Carrie run away, was nothing compared to having Carrie appear, look straight into Maura's eyes, and then turn away. Time had passed, but nothing had healed. She bowed her head, crying.

  J.D. was in the pool beside her. He stayed right there, saying nothing. After a moment, she felt him reach for her hand. He held it while she cried. His hand felt so warm.

  “Maura,” he said, after a few minutes.

  They'd always been about water, Maura and J.D. Climbing the Jamestown Bridge, making love on the catwalk, the tide and currents of Narragansett Bay rushing below. She'd lain awake so many nights, seeing the island lights reflected in that black water, hearing the sound of the waves striking the shore down below the bridge, feeling his arms around her as she tried to push the thoughts away and fall asleep.

  “Come here,” he said now.

  She looked at him, her eyes bleary with tears. He slid his fingers around her wrist. Holding on tight, he looked into her eyes. She needed his comfort, needed her daughter's father. Her breath was ragged as she undressed, aware of his eyes on her body.

  Things had changed over the years. She'd had three children. Sorrow had weighed her down. Her posture wasn't that of the wild, exuberant young college graduate who'd spent that summer with him. But when she slid into the water, she still fit perfectly into his arms.

  He held her close, their bodies pressing against each other. He kissed her, and she was so hungry for his mouth. The heat made her see stars, filled her with more passion than she'd felt that summer. They had had a baby, lived separate lives. Her body quivered, pushing against his, wanting every inch of her to be touching every inch of him.

  His mouth covered hers; his touch was both gentle
and rough. She ran her hands up and down his sides. His belly was flat, concave. Scars on his back and legs felt like thin braids, hard and upraised. She kissed his lips, then his neck, making her way down his body.

  The glimmering green light surrounded them as she tugged on his bathing trunks. He helped them off, holding her afloat and pulling her onto him. His legs moved rhythmically; she noticed that, he was getting better. The warm water buoyed them as he entered her, she felt slippery and hot, and they held each other tight, balancing at the edge of the pool.

  Maura's insides melted all around him. Their faces were touching, eyes, mouths, everything. They didn't want any space between them. They might as well have been back on the bridge, nothing but air below them, swaying with danger. But one arm slung around J.D.'s neck, feeling him support her with his arm and legs, with all that warm water embracing them, Maura knew she was safe.

  The pool sloshed, the water making small waves that broke the surface, spilling out over the marble apron. Maura listened, remembering the waves at the foot of the bridge, how afraid she'd been to look down. If only she'd done then what she was doing now—gazing into J.D.'s clear blue eyes, feeling his love, knowing he'd hold her forever. Together they shuddered and released, all the years of being apart, all the fear and sadness.

  Maura buried her face in his neck, wanting to hold on to this feeling. She was together with her daughter's father. He'd loved her. He'd built a lighthouse for her, for Carrie.

  Thoughts poured in. Andy. Travis and Beck. Carrie on the lake. Carrie that afternoon in Providence. An echo sounded—voices coming up the pipes, perhaps from the library or students' rooms downstairs. The noise brought Maura out of something like a trance. J.D. held her loosely; he was watching.

  “Do you hear those voices?” she asked.

  “I only hear yours,” he said.

  “I hear them. Kids talking somewhere …”

  “This room echoes,” he said.

  “The ghosts,” she said. “Do you believe in them?”

  “I believe in you,” he said.

  “Your great-grandfather,” she said. “And his enemy. And the sisters—Mary and Beatrice.”

  “There's the past,” he said. “And the present. I'm done with the past.”

  “Is that possible?” she whispered. “It's so much a part of who we are….”

  “Let's be right here,” he said, holding her. “Right now. No more ghosts.”

  “You were swimming,” she said, easing back from him, gently pushing his arms away. “Your legs …”

  “I use my arms,” he said. “The doctors in Providence did their best. But it didn't work.”

  “They said it would take time, didn't they?” she said. Blinking, she brushed water from her eyes.

  He'd let her back up, put a foot of water between them. But at that, he reached out, hooked her with his hand, pulled her hard against him again. His breath was short, more intense than it had been when he stopped swimming.

  “They said it, but I know what I know.” He held her, staring into her eyes.

  “I want you to get better,” she said. “I can't stand what I did to you.”

  “You didn't do anything to me. I fell all on my own.”

  Maura knew he was trying to reassure her, and part of her wanted to be let off the hook. She'd been young, she'd been trying to protect Andy. Those are the things she'd told herself over the years. Now she shook her head, holding on tight. “You wouldn't have if I had done the right thing.”

  “What would that have been?”

  And Maura didn't know.

  “‘Right’ is one of those pointless words,” he said, pushing the wet hair out of her eyes, kissing her.

  “I don't know about that,” she said.

  “We have a history, Maura. But we also have the present. We could have each other, the way I've wanted it all along….”

  “J.D.,” she whispered.

  “Don't give up hope,” he said.

  “She doesn't want to be found,” Maura said.

  “I don't believe that,” he said. “And neither do you.”

  “I have to get home,” she said, kissing J.D.'s lips. “My other kids might wake up and wonder where I am.”

  She pulled away, swam across the pool to the ladder. She dried herself off, got dressed, listening the whole time for him to tell her to stop.

  But he didn't, so she just kept going, and didn't look back.

  He stayed by the edge of the pool, watching her go, a trail of water left behind on the marble floor. The room echoed, and he heard her footsteps. He heard his own breath. He felt her on his skin, in his bones. He'd held Maura in his arms; he could have called her back, and he knew she'd have come. They'd belonged to each other all this time. He'd stayed alive for this.

  He would do anything for her, he would do the thing she needed and wanted more than anything in the world. People needed air, water, food. Maura needed love, she needed her children. Everyone meant well, and was trying so hard—Katharine, even Stephen and Ted. Angus.

  But J.D. was Carrie's father. She had traveled all the way to Rhode Island from the lake, just to stand by his bedside and make sure he survived. She'd taken that risk for him, and he was going to do whatever it took to help his daughter find her way home. He'd do it for Maura.

  Dell Harwood was the key. He was sure of that, and wheelchair or not, he was going to do what it took. Treading water, he listened for the elevator. It creaked upward, and the doors opened. He heard them close behind Maura. He didn't want to leave the water, where he'd been with her, but he hauled himself out of the pool. He had to move now, and fast. Maura was hanging on, but he saw what this was doing to her.

  And J.D. couldn't live with that. Not one minute more than necessary.

  21SEEING MY MOTHER FALL APART AFTER THE COM-petition threw me for the biggest loop ever. My mother is so strong. Even at my father's funeral, she held me and Travis together, helped us know we could go on. I've never seen her the way she was on Thayer Street, wild and crying, so pale I thought she might dissolve. It scared me.

  For comfort I sat in the reading room by the fire. Outside a storm was building, snow and wind—a blizzard. I had homework to do, plenty of it. Plus, having made it through the regional maths, I now had nationals coming up before Christmas break. Redmond was excited. He'd shown me Providence, and now we were going to Boston. I felt as if he was on a tour-guide roll—but how could he best Carrie Tower? That is the best landmark I've ever seen.

  In spite of all that schoolwork, I couldn't concentrate. Maybe it was seeing my mother so devastated, perhaps it was the fact I'd been in Providence and, although I did feel close to Carrie, I didn't honestly see her. Not the way I'd hoped or even expected. I swear, I thought she'd be standing right there; but she wasn't.

  My hand goes to the shelf, pulls down a book. I hold it, feeling the history flow into my skin. Sisters who lost each other pull me like a magnet. I've had it in my family for so long: my mother and Aunt Katharine, now me and Carrie. I guess that's why I feel such a connection with Mary and Beatrice, why the only thing I can imagine reading right now was written by Mary.

  Mary's journal is written with blue ink, in beautiful penmanship, with flourishes. The book is bound in faded and tattered red leather; the word Diary was once embossed in gold, but the letters have faded. Mary's handwriting—and later, Beatrice's—outlasted the gold leaf.

  Mary started this diary, and Beatrice finished it. That's how it is with sisters. They'd probably have fought like mad, during life, if one caught the other even touching it. But after Mary's death, Beatrice must have come upon her book—just as I have. She must have read Mary's words—just as I have. And then added some of her own thoughts …

  It's cold outside. The wind is circling down the chimney, making sparks fly. The fire feels cozy, but outside the storm is picking up. I don't like storms; they remind me of the people taken from me.

  My heart is beating fast. I try to calm down, tell myself
I'm with the Langley sisters. This is my favorite place in the school. Blackstone Hall has thick walls to keep the storm out, and Redmond is beside me. And reading this diary, now I know why it's on the shelf right beside the book about Rose Hawthorne. I've solved one mystery….

  Turns out Rose Hawthorne ran a cancer hospital in New York, back in the days when people thought the disease was contagious. She was a nun, and Beatrice went to work with her, to honor her and Mary's mother, who died of cancer. Beatrice sounds so kind, caring, and good.

  When I read her entries in Mary's diary, written after the accident, I love her so much I can't stand it. As an older sister, she reminds me of Carrie. But as someone who's lost a sister, she reminds me of me.

  Here's Beatrice right after Mary died:

  December 15

  Mary.

  January 10

  I only want to write her name: Mary.

  I have returned to Newport, because this is where I last saw her. Her birthday, the last days we would spend together. It is impossible to believe. Uncle Percival drove her away from this place, and his carriage went off the cliff. Father cannot speak of it. Mr. Blackstone had to tell me. Even he wished not to divulge the details, but I pressed him. If Mary had to suffer them, I had to hear.

  There was snow and ice on the ground. A storm had blown off the Atlantic, bringing thick, wet snow, then air from Canada had dropped the temperatures and frozen everything. But the night of the accident, the air had warmed. The worst ice had melted, and fog rolled in.

  People talk about Uncle Perce's judgment. I expect Father feels the same way. Why did he drive along the cliff edge during such dangerous conditions? Sitting here, holding my sister's diary, writing these thoughts, I know that blame will do nothing but destroy us. Uncle Perce wished to bring Mary home for dinner with his family; she wanted to be with them, and bring all of us together. I know her. Christmas was coming, and that was her Christmas wish.