What My Sister Remembered

by Marilyn Sachs

  “There was no we then,” said my mother angrily. “Then there was only me.”

  “Yes,” Beth cried. “There was only you.”

  “Yes,” my mother agreed, standing up again. “There was only me. And I had two young boys to look after and ... and an alcoholic husband.”

  My father sat down and looked at his plate.

  “I’m sorry, Walter,” my mother said, very, very slowly. “It was a long time ago, and you worked it out finally. You’re a good man now, and you’re a good father now, but then I was all alone, and I couldn’t ... I couldn’t take any more. I couldn’t save the whole world.”

  “It wasn’t the whole world,” Beth cried. “It was only me. And I loved you. And I thought you loved me. I thought ...”

  My mother sat down and started to cry. She put her face in her hands, and her shoulders shook.

  “I didn’t mean anything,” Ginger said. “I’m sorry. I never should have asked.”

  “It’s better you did,” Beth said. “I needed to tell her, to have it out with her. She can’t deny she sent me away. She can’t deny it.”

  My mother wasn’t denying anything. She kept on crying, and the rest of us just sat there, listening. My mind was flashing with sounds of screams and crying, and I felt so frightened, I couldn’t move.

  Finally Lisa said, “You have to stop being angry, Beth. It seems to me like you’ve got wonderful parents who love you.”

  “Yes,” Beth said, “I do. And I love them.”

  “So it worked out okay then. My mother-in-law is a very good woman. She’s had to put up with a lot in her life, and it hasn’t been easy for her. Everybody makes mistakes, but as my Uncle Stuart used to say, ‘You have to forgive and forget.’’

  “I can forgive,” Beth said, “but I can’t forget.”

  “Better to forget.” Jeff was talking now. “Lots of things you have to forget to stay normal.”

  “Like what do you have to forget?” Alex asked. “Your problem seems to be you can never remember.”

  But Jeff was looking at my father, and Alex followed his eyes and suddenly grew silent. My father continued to sit still, looking down at his empty plate. An alcoholic? My father? No, I couldn’t remember him drinking anything more than Diet Coke or coffee. But my father sat there, stooped over his plate, saying nothing, and my mother’s face was still buried in her hands.

  The scared feeling inside me moved up to the top of my head and down into my toes. There wasn’t any part of me that wasn’t scared. I looked at Beth’s red, angry face, and I hated her so much, I thought I would burst.

  So many secrets that weren’t mine. So many terrible memories that I was shut out of—that I couldn’t remember, memories that were cruel and that hurt people I loved. I was helpless against all those memories.

  It all happened so quickly. I was scared and helpless, and in my head, the screaming began again and went on and on. I put up my hands to my head to make it stop, and inside of it, inside the screaming, I remembered.

  “You had a doll,” I cried, pointing my finger at Beth, “a baby doll with a pink dress and a bonnet, and she said it was your doll, not mine.”

  “What? ... What did you say?” Beth turned to look at me, astonished.

  My mother lifted her face out of her hands.

  “Mommy said it was your doll, and I should play with my own, and I cried because I wanted yours so bad.”

  “Now, Molly, you stop that!” Alex said sharply. “You don’t always have to be the center of attention.”

  “No.” Beth wrinkled up her face. “No, I never had a doll with a pink dress. I had a Barbie doll that she (looking at my mom) gave me once, but I never—"

  “Yes, yes, you did.” Now I was crying the way I had then, when I remembered how I had wanted that doll. “And Mommy was mad at me, and I kept crying—it was in the car. Before it happened. And then ... then you let me have it. You said I should stop crying, and you’d let me play with it. You ... you”—I was crying very hard now—”You were nice to me then.”

  “I don’t remember,” Beth said. “I don’t remember a baby doll with a pink dress. Are you sure?”

  Now I was the one who had to gulp the air in order to continue. “She had such a beautiful face, that doll. But then it happened—and she wasn’t beautiful anymore. Her head broke in pieces in my hands, and I screamed and screamed—

  “I don’t remember,” Beth said. “I just don’t remember.”

  It was very quiet in the room, and then Jeff began laughing. My father straightened up and looked at him.

  “What a wild day!” Jeff said. “This is turning into a real encounter session. Maybe there’s somebody else who wants to unload some fascinating memory that nobody else remembers. No time like the present.”

  “Jeff!” my father rumbled.

  “Sorry, Dad, but, hey, if nobody else wants to come up with an interesting memory, I’ve got a few I wouldn’t mind sharing with the rest of you.”

  My mother was directing one of her concentrated looks at him, and he turned toward her, smiling. “Just kidding, Mom. You know I was just kidding.”

  Alex laughed, and Lisa drank some water, and Beth sat down. Aunt Helene hesitated and then returned to her own seat. But nobody wanted any more lasagna, not even me.

  Chapter 12

  “You’re not really like what I’d thought you’d be,” Beth told me.

  We were in the kitchen, and she was getting ready to leave. The grown-ups were out in the hall, talking. I braced myself.

  “I mean I thought you were going to be very pretty, and—I don’t mean to insult you, Molly, but you do look a lot like me, I guess, and I’m not exactly a raving beauty.”

  I thought I was prettier than she, except for her hair, maybe, but I kept it to myself.

  “And I thought you’d be more of a spoiled brat.”

  Look who’s talking, I thought, but I kept that to myself too.

  “But you’re not really mean or selfish, I guess, even if you are undeveloped. Of course you’re still young.”

  She put up her hand to smooth her hair, and the charms on her bracelet danced.

  “That is such a beautiful bracelet,” I told her. “Did you get it for a birthday present?”

  “What? This?” She looked down at it. “No, it used to be my mom’s. She liked charm bracelets when she was a girl. Actually, I have three others. Do you want it?”

  “What?”

  She took it off and held it out to me. “Here. It will be something to remember me by.”

  “Oh, Beth, I don’t know. It looks so expensive.”

  “Go ahead, take it, Molly. I’ve got three others.”

  So I took it and slipped it on my wrist. It was so beautiful, I wanted to throw my arms around somebody and kiss her.

  But not Beth. I still felt shy and awkward with her. “Thank you, Beth,” I said. “But now you have to take something from me. What have I got that you’d like?”

  She was looking at the kitchen window again, and I knew what it was she wanted.

  “My earrings,” I said. “I got them for my birthday, and I want you to have them. They’re beautiful, and I want to give you something special.”

  She took them and said thank you. But I knew I couldn’t give her, nobody could, what she really wanted.

  * * * *

  I sat on my mother’s lap after everybody had gone home. We were in the living room—both my parents and I. My dad was smoking a cigarette and sitting in the chair in front of the fan. My mother and I were on the couch. I could hear both of the fans whirring and the sounds of car horns rising up from the street.

  “Mom,” I began, “if I had been the one who was hurt and away in the hospital. If it had been me—”

  “No!” My mother tightened her arms around me.

  “But, Mom, you said you couldn’t take any more. You said you couldn’t save the world. You said you were alone ...”

  My father stubbed out his cigarette and lit ano
ther one.

  “Now, Molly, I want you to understand one thing. Your father is a good man, a wonderful man, and I wasn’t blaming him.”

  “It’s all right, Karen, you can blame me. You should blame me. It’s a long time ago—maybe it isn’t such a long time—eight years ago—but Molly, I drank, and your mother—she threw me out then. The boys remember. They don’t like to talk about it, but they remember.”

  “He was always good to them, Molly,” my mom said. “I mean he never hurt them but—."

  “But I went off on binges, and I spent money, and I kept getting fired from my jobs.”

  “So that’s why I wasn’t myself when the accident happened. I was deep in my own troubles. And your father—well, he came out of it soon after, and he’s been a real rock ever since.”

  “But, Mom ...” I needed to ask her the one question that still plagued me.

  “I think maybe it’s a good thing Beth spoke up,” said my father. “Maybe we all need to be reminded of things that happened. Maybe if we remember, we won’t make the same mistakes again.”

  “She was wrong,” my mother said. “I didn’t send her away—not forever. But I couldn’t take care of her then. I just couldn’t.”

  “If I’d been on my feet, you could have,” my father insisted. “So don’t go blaming yourself. I’m the one you should blame. I’m the one Beth should blame. You had too much responsibility for one person.”

  “I needed time,” my mother said. “I would have taken her, once she recovered but ... but ... then the Lattimores got into it, and everything changed. I would have taken her, but then I was half out of my mind. I was close to cracking up myself. And Mrs. Lattimore kept pressuring me. She was dying to take Beth, and by that time, Beth ... well, Beth wanted to go with them,”

  “Mom!” I tried again. “Mom, if it had been me who was hurt, would you have put me into that foster home?”

  My mother’s arms rocked me back and forth. She didn’t answer my question, but I knew what the answer was.

  We sat comfortably, quietly, for a little while, listening to the sounds of the fans and the cars below. It was still very hot, and I could feel the heat in my mother’s arms spreading into my own body.

  “The most terrible thing,” my mother said finally, “is Beth ... what I’ve done to Beth. She hates me so much. She’ll always hate me. There’s nothing I can do and nothing I can say. But I was in terrible shape then—and I know I would have taken her, once I got back on my feet again. I know I would have. I just needed time, and if Mrs. Lattimore hadn’t pushed and pushed ...”

  “I think Beth understands now,” my dad said. “She’s no dope, and I don’t think she ever realized what you were up against. Okay, she got it off her chest, and she heard what you had to say, and I’m sure she feels better now.”

  “Do you really think so?” My mother looked anxiously at him. “Do you think she ... she’s not so angry at me anymore?”

  “I’m sure she isn’t.”

  I held up my wrist. “Look, Mom, she gave me her charm bracelet, and before she left, she said she was glad she came.”

  My mother let out a breath and nodded. I didn’t tell my mother what I think Beth will always know and what I think all of us know. Nobody said it out loud, not even Beth exactly. But Beth knows and I know that my mother, my aunt could choose only one of us then, and she chose me. Why? It wasn’t because I hadn’t been hurt. It was something else, something more important, something wonderful for me and terrible for Beth. How could she ever forgive my mother or forgive me for being the one she picked? I was glad that Beth’s family loved her the way they did, and I knew I would never, ever be jealous of her again.

  My father suddenly laughed out loud. Both of us turned toward him, startled. “That Lisa!” he said. “Did you hear what she said?”

  “Can you ever not hear what she says?” my mother said impatiently.

  “No, no, Karen. I think you missed what she said about you. You were out of it then, but she stuck up for you when Beth was carrying on.”

  “I never heard that,” said my mother.

  “Oh, yes,” I chimed in. “She said something like ‘My mother-in-law is a real good woman,’ and that it’s been hard for you, and that Beth had to forgive and forget.”

  “She said that? Lisa?”

  “Uh-huh, and she told Beth that she was lucky to have parents who loved her and that she had to stop being angry.”

  “Are you sure Lisa said all that?”

  “Oh yes. Then, later, she started talking about her heartburn again.”

  My mother smiled. “Well, I guess maybe even she has a few good points. I tell you what, though. I really liked Ginger. She’s about the first friend of Jeff’s I’ve ever liked.”

  “She’s crazy about him,” I said.

  “Jeff?” My mother rolled her eyes up to the ceiling. “Well, I must say she’s a nice, polite girl. And her clothes were very neat. Maybe she’ll have a good influence on him.”

  “What a voice!” said my father. “She can really blast you out of your seat with a voice like that.”

  “And I was surprised at those cute songs Jeff was singing with Beth. He really can come up with some nice songs—some nice, clean songs—if he tries.”

  “He’s going to California for Christmas,” I told my parents. “Aunt Helene invited him and Ginger, and they said yes. They invited me too.”

  “Well, that’s okay.” My father lit another cigarette.

  My mother didn’t say anything.

  “I don’t think I’ll go.”

  “You can go if you want to,” said my mom, “She’s a nice person, I guess, Mrs. Lattimore, and Beth ... well ... Beth is your sister.”

  “She doesn’t feel like my sister,” I said. I didn’t say that we both feel awkward when we’re together or that Beth really doesn’t like me. It’s not a good feeling knowing somebody doesn’t like you, even if you know why. I would like to see her house, though, and check out those bathrooms. But not for a while. “Besides, I’d rather stay home. We had a lot of fun last year.”

  “Jeff won’t be here,” my mother said. “I hope he doesn’t stay too long with the Lattimores. Sometimes that boy doesn’t have any sense at all.”

  “We’ll have Alex and Lisa—and the new little guy,” said my dad.

  “I hope they don’t call him Stuart,” I said. “That’s a terrible name for a boy.” I leaned back against my mother, and I felt such a rush of happiness that I had to close my eyes to keep it all inside of me.

  “You know something?” my father said. “It’s crazy, but I’m actually hungry.”

  “Me too.” I opened my eyes. “And we’ve got lots of lasagna left and salad and French bread.”

  My father waved impatiently. “I don’t want any bread or salad—but a little piece of that lasagna— cold lasagna ... How about you, Karen?”

  “No, I’m not hungry. But I am thirsty.”

  “They drank up all the lemonade,” I said. “But there’s 7-up and Diet Coke.”

  “Funny how she remembered that I used to make lemonade.” My mother smoothed my hair. “Kathy used to love it, too, the way Beth does, but you”—she smiled at me—”you always hated it, and the boys didn’t care one way or the other. I guess I stopped making it after Kathy died, and Beth ... Beth went away. I forgot how I used to make it all the time.”

  “She’s a good kid, basically, that Beth,” said my father. “She’s smart and talented, and I have to hand it to her how she’s interested in the world. She’ll make something of herself, you can be sure of that. But the things she remembers make her angry. And she has some memory. Maybe it’s not so good having such a memory.”

  “She forgot about the baby doll with the pink dress,” I said.

  “I hope she’ll begin to forget other things too,” said my mother, easing me off her lap.

  “What are you doing?” I complained.

  “I’m going to get some food for you and Daddy.”
>
  “I’ll help,” said my father, beginning to rise.

  “No, Walter. I think I’d like a few minutes by myself.” My mother walked out of the room, and my father and I looked at each other.

  “She’s still upset,” my father whispered.

  “I know.”

  “It’s too bad.” My father shook his head and took a deep puff at his cigarette. “She’s a wonderful woman, your mother, and I gave her a terrible time of it.”

  “It’s all over, Daddy,” I said, moving over to him. “You heard what Lisa said. We have to forgive and forget.”

  I sat down on his lap and rested my head against his chest. I knew he was feeling bad, and I loved him so much, I wanted to do something to make him feel better. The smell of his cigarette was caught up by the fan and circulated around me. “Daddy,” I said, “you have to stop smoking or you’ll get cancer. It was in the newspaper today, Beth said.” The paper was lying, neatly folded, over on the ledge in front of the window. I jumped off his lap, picked it up, and began leafing through it. “I’ll find it for you, Daddy. I want you to live a long, long time. I want my children—"

  “Molly!” My father’s face was twisted up in horror. “Molly, you’re sounding just like Beth. Don’t tell me you’re going to turn out like her.”

  I giggled and continued sifting through the paper. I knew I wasn’t going to turn out like Beth. I didn’t know who or what I was going to turn out like, but I knew I was happy and I knew I wasn’t afraid.

  With love to my daughter-in-law,

  Ann Rendahl

  Copyright © 1992 by Marilyn Sachs

  Originally published by Dutton Juvenile [0525449531]

  Electronically published in 2012 by Belgrave House

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  No portion of this book may be reprinted in whole or in part,

  by printing, faxing, E-mail, copying electronically or by any

  other means without permission of the publisher. For more

  information, contact Belgrave House, 190 Belgrave Avenue, San

  Francisco, CA 94117-4228

  http://www.BelgraveHouse.com