“You’re beautiful”, he told her and she smiled at him, stroke a pose for the camera in his hand. Click, click. Smile again for me.
They were happy, they were only happy with each other, they were each other’s only happiness. They didn’t need to do the things their father made them do to feel close, his body was in hers even now, standing feet away from her, and her body was in his. They were one. They were each other’s only friend and he loved her.
If only he wasn’t there...
If only he didn’t exist...
“Helena!” His father’s voice called out, and suddenly she wasn’t there anymore, not on the bed, not in the wardrobe where she used to hide, not under the bed. He had not seen him but he knew his father had taken her away again. And he started screaming, calling her name...
Helena.
Helena...
Then he was wide awake.
William lifted his back from the mattress panting, looking straight ahead of him, searching the darkness, looking for her, trying to see her face again, to keep her inside a while longer.
“William?”
Where are you? Where are you?
“William,” Jessica stroked his back propped up on one elbow next to him, naked, just as she had been while he watched her falling asleep. “Are you all right?”
No. He couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t speak, he didn’t want her to see this side of him. He shook his head hugging his knees to his chest, his eyes still closed. He knew she was looking at him, worried.
“What is it?”
“Just a bad dream, go to sleep.” Don’t see me, don’t see me like this.
He sat still and waited and Jessica quietly turned her back to him and he waited until he seemed able to breathe properly, until his legs stopped shaking between his arms, then laid down behind her, holding her close, his lips on the back of her neck.
“I’m sorry.” All he could tell her.
Jessica held his hands snuggling closer into him. They fitted in each other perfectly, like spoons.
“What happened?”
“It was just a nightmare. I have bad dreams sometimes.”
She could feel his heart pounding through his chest against her back. “Are you ok?”
“I’m ok,” he kissed her shoulder. “Go back to sleep.”
He closed his eyes hoping she had done the same, hoping she would wake up in the morning and forget about what had just happened, hoping she wouldn’t mention it. But after a long time, when he thought she was asleep again, he heard her clearing her throat.
“William?”
“Yes?”
“Who’s Helena?” He held his breath behind her. “You were calling her name.”
Helena, Helena, Helena...
“My sister. That was her name. I dream about her.”
He fell silent again and Jessica turned to face him, looking for his eyes in the blackness of the bedroom, her fingers through his hair. And he could see her, even in the dark, her features so similar to his sister’s, so wonderfully similar he could even pretend it was her, and for a few seconds it was Helena laying next to him, just as she used to when they were kids, holding each other, protecting each other. How much he’d loved her and how much he loved her still. Their love was the only love he’d ever known, their irrational love was the only rational element in his life and his father had taken it away from him, together with his childhood, his happiness and her virginity.
“She killed herself when she was thirteen. My father abused her.”
She wanted take back the freedom he had stolen. Nobody could hurt her now. Nobody could force her to do anything at all.
It was strange to hear himself talk about it, he had never told anyone before. But he could talk, he could talk to Jessica.
He tightened his arms around her feeling her body, feeling her back and the curve of her hips, knowing that what she was thinking about wasn’t his hands on her skin, but the sister she also had lost.
“You see? This is why I can help you. This is why I know what you feel. We come from the same place. I know what you need because it’s what I need. I’ll help you if you help me. I know you can.”
Help me.
She buried her head between his neck and his shoulder and nodded, without saying a word and let him play with her hair, listened to the sound of his heart beating, the sound of his lungs breathing. Soothing. Relaxing. She listened to his body for a long time, long after he fell asleep again and when she was sure he couldn’t hear her she told him she loved him. It was still so impossibly early, crazy, irrational, yet it felt so true. She felt so close to him. And she believed him.
25 December 2000
WILLIAM WAS coming over for dinner, just like he had suggested that first afternoon in her newly yellow kitchen.
The lights of the Christmas tree were on, golden and warm and the sitting room was filled with the comforting smell of pine.
Her family had only ever owned a plastic tree. Every year it would pop out of a box, smaller and smaller as both she and Kaitlyn grew taller and taller, bits of snow made of cotton wool from earlier Chrismases still stuck on some of the branches. Every year they would use the same decorations, chewed up by time, discoloured in places, bits missing, old fashioned. But this year Jessica wanted to do things properly, she had been out three days earlier to buy a real tree and new decorations, lights, little wooden figurines to scatter among the branches with red and white sugar canes that no one would eat. Nothing else. This year she wanted to do things properly for him. She wanted to change his mind, she wanted to show William how Christmas didn’t have to be fake, cheap or terribly expensive, it was just about spending time with people you loved and giving them a little bit of yourself to take with them for the rest of the year. This is what her mother had taught her. She had tried to teach her daughters that it wasn’t about the presents, because those they could never afford, but it was about spending time together, making biscuits, decorating the house, going for walks along the river, spotting Christmas lights through the neighbourhood’s windows. It didn’t matter that what she remembered the most was her father drinking too much, falling asleep on his reclining chair before they even had a chance to have dinner together like any normal family. It didn’t matter that what she remembered were not the Christmas songs her mother tried to teach them when they were little, but her screams of pain later on at night. It couldn’t matter because her mother had tried to show them the beauty of Christmas despite everything, and it wasn’t her fault if her father had instead showed them something else. Forgetting about her optimism, ignoring her good heart would have been disrespectful.
Jessica placed the centerpiece she had bought in the middle of the kitchen table: a wide round cream candle surrounded by twigs, large green leaves, dried orange slices and cinnamon sticks. A small turkey was in the oven, potatoes, carrots and spinach ready to toss in warm oil. Seasonal music played from the stereo in the sitting room. Everything was ready and Jessica was feeling both nervous and sad.
This was her first Christmas without her sister. She had tried not to think about her all day —unsuccessfully— had tried not to think about the silver bracelet she had bought for Kaitlyn a few days ago. It was ridiculous and irrational, she knew, but buying something her sister would have liked had made her absence more bearable. And no, William had just knocked at the door and she wasn’t going to think about it anymore, not now.
Jessica walked towards the door checking the rows of lit tea lights she had decided to line up on the floor on both sides of the corridor. The place felt cozy and warm, exactly the way she had intended it. Perfect.
“Happy Christmas.” She sang opening the door.
William stood back admiring her before walking in. She was wearing a simple mid- length black dress, red lips; her long hair fra
med her face beautifully. He could have cried.
He was holding a bottle of champagne and a pale pink box from Dragonfly Cakes on Gate Road.
“Happy Christmas.” He returned getting closer to her, kissing her lips. “As promised, champagne and pecan pie.”
The first thing he noticed was the music, Sinatra singing Mistletoe and Holly, then the candles on the floor, then as he walked on, the minimalist Christmas tree standing between the two large windows in the sitting room, opposite the sofa. Underneath it, a solitary present wrapped in red paper topped with a white silk ribbon.
“All we need now is snow falling outside the windows,” he joked, resting his free hand around her waist. “You went to all this trouble just for me?”
“I’m afraid you are the only guest here tonight, yes.”
“Thank you. I don’t really know what to say. I’m touched.” He offered the bottle of champagne. “Should we have a glass?”
“Yes, please. Take your coat off, have a seat. Dinner is not ready yet so make yourself comfortable.”
Jessica disappeared in the kitchen with the bottle and the pale pink box and reappeared with a flute in each hand.
“To coming home?” He proposed.
“To coming home,” she accepted not really knowing what he meant. She sat herself on the edge of the sofa looking nervous. “So... I’ve been walking around the city for the past week trying to decide if your cynicism would allow you to accept a present. Then I remember today is all about changing your mind about Christmas day so I went ahead and got you one.” She leaned towards the tree and picked the red parcel off the floor. “I hope you don’t mind.”
William laughed anxiously holding the present on his lap, both hands flat on top of it for what seemed an eternity. Then finally started pulling at the white ribbon.
“I have a confession to make. I am terrible at receiving gifts. I will try my best to be gracious but you really didn’t have to, Jessica. This is too...”
When the paper fell away revealing the book she had so carefully wrapped, the expression on his face was not of delight, but almost despair.
It was a first edition hard back of The Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, a light grey cloth cover, gold lettering on the front and along the spine.
“You hate it.” Her shoulders suddenly slumped, as if the expression on his face was too much of a burden to bear.
William was coming across as rude and disrespectful, he knew, yet he found he couldn’t explain himself, he could not speak.
Christian Andersen... His were the fairy tales that his mother read to him and his sister, every night before bedtime as children, all of them from a single book that she cherished more than a bible. William had always loved his stories, even when he should have been too young to understand the themes. The feeling of pain at being different was a recurrent motif in many of them and they made sense to him, they made him feel normal, like there was a place he might belong. They weren’t stupid, insignificant, patronising stories written with cheerful and idiotic children in mind; they seemed written for a different audience, an audience of more grown up kids who were somehow disillusioned, who knew about suffering and death and grief and were not afraid of it, just had to confront it.
The day after Helena’s death, his mother had silently entered his room leaving a small slim book on his bed. It was one of Andersen’s tales, The Story of a Mother. William could still remember sitting there, reading about a woman whose ill daughter gets taken by Death. It was the story of her journey and all the obstacles she overtakes to find her child, only to let her go again after discovering that, taking her away from Death, would mean take her back to a future of misery and misfortune. He could remember hating his mother afterwards, knowing that all she had tried to do with the book was to give him an explanation for letting go of her daughter so easily. But it wasn’t an explanation, it was an excuse. Didn’t she know? Couldn’t she see that if Helena’s future was going to be bleak, it was only because of the present her own mother had never tried to prevent? He looked up at Jessica, tried to clear his throat, clear his mind, tried to smile.
“I don’t hate it. Please forgive me. I told you I’m not good at receiving gifts. It’s just that, I haven’t seen a Christian Andersen book in a long time. I read a lot of it as a kid and it’s just... It’s just surprising. I didn’t expect it, today, from you. I don’t... What made you buy it?”
How could she possibly have known?
She shrugged. “I just knew I wanted to give you a book. I wanted to give you something I would have liked to receive. I don’t know if it sounds stupid but I wanted to give you something that would make you feel closer to me. I love Andersen. This was one of my favourite books when I was a teenager.” William leaned over to kiss her lips, he looped her hair behind one of her ears. “It’s not stupid. Thank you.” He whispered. “I’d never thought we’d have so much in common.”
He grabbed the coat he had left on the arm of the sofa and fished out a little rectangular black box from the inside pocket.
“This is for you. It doesn’t seem half as thoughtful now but... Happy Christmas.”
Jessica opened the box to find a small round diamond pendant on a thin silver chain, elegant and understated.
“I love it. But you really didn’t have to.”
“I only had one present to buy this year. I had to make it a good one.”
She turned her back to him, pulled her hair up. “Could you?”
William closed the silver chain around her neck. When she turned around beaming to show him the pendant, he felt strangely emotional. Was it seeing something he had chosen against her skin? Was it because she looked so happy, so radiant?
“What do you think?”
“I think you’re amazing. With and without the necklace.”
She kissed him, again and again until they were both lying on the sofa, her on top of him.
“I’m starting to like this Christmas business. I might come back next year.”
“Why wait till next year? Why don’t you just come back tomorrow?”
“Who said I was leaving?”
“Mhmm... Have you got something special in mind for later?”
“Ever had sex with Santa Clause? I look kinda hot with a white beard.”
She laughed. “I’m sorry, it just isn’t the same without the oversized belly.”
Just then, the timer she had set for the turkey rang and she jumped off him.
“That’ll be our dinner, I hope you’re hungry cause we have a lot of food to get through.”
“Don’t you worry about that, I’ve been saving myself.”
He followed her into the kitchen, admired the decoration on the table, watched her getting the turkey out of the oven.
“Anything I can do?” He asked picking at a spinach leaf.
“Not really. You can just stand there and look happy.”
“I’m doing my best.” He smiled.
“You’re doing a great job.”
William noticed a Christmas card stuck on the fridge with a tomato shaped magnet: it was Snoopy the dog lying on the roof his red dog-house, his belly, nose and the top of his feet covered in snow, Woodstock the bird flying above him holding a star in his rounded beak. He casually opened it to read the inside.
“Who sends Peanuts Christmas cards in this day and age? I haven’t seen one of these since the eighties.”
“Someone called Charlie Brown.” He laughed. She had to be kidding. “That’s his name, Charles Brown.”
William frowned. “I thought you didn’t know anyone here. And of all people... Charlie Brown?”
“I know, you couldn’t make it up. He’s the detective who came to see me the day Kaitlyn died, when I called the police. He’s an old man, don’t worry.”
&nb
sp; “And he sent you a Christmas card?”
Jessica took the oven mittens off and moved the turkey from the metal tin onto a chopping board. “He’s a nice man, what can I tell you.”
She could have said more, but she decided not to. He didn’t need to know about Brown, she didn’t want to talk about Kaitlyn’s death, not again. Not today.
“Would you like to carve?”
4 January 2001
THE ELEVATOR’s doors opened right in front of a large mahogany desk. The woman sitting behind it was blond, pretty, probably in her early thirties. Too much make up for his liking.
Brown had always liked women as natural as they could possibly come; he never even minded his wife not shaving her armpits and legs when she was still well enough to care. Chiara had never been particularly hairy. She shaved rarely, never in winter and only if she felt like wearing something revealing. She often joked about the fact that he would be the only man in Florida who preferred a hairy woman to the completely waxed Barbie dolls parading up and down beaches along the coast. How she would laugh knowing he even missed her armpits now, their musky smell, passing his hands along her calves and feeling her sporadic hair under his fingers.
The young woman at the desk lifted her eyes, smiled, studied him. Did she know him? Did he have an appointment?
“Good afternoon, my name is Charles Brown, San Francisco police.” He took his badge out of the pocket of his grey jacket, lifted it towards her. “I need to see your... boss? Roger Wither?” The woman was squinting, shaking her head, probably trying to remember if she had arranged a meeting for him that she had forgotten about. “I don’t have an appointment. I understand he might be busy, but this is really only going to take a few minutes. If you could just let him know I’m here?”
She smiled again, a brief, insincere smile. “Let me see what I can do.” She picked up the phone and dialed a single digit, then covered the receiver with one hand. “Sorry, Mr? Did you say...?”
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