The Language of Sisters: A Novel Read online

  “Shane?” I said loudly. “Shane?” I hung up, then tried to reach him again but couldn’t get through. “Dammit!” I swore softly under my breath as I slammed down the receiver.

  Mom chose this moment to emerge from the kitchen, her coat and hat already on. “Who was that?” she asked as she pulled on a pair of brown leather gloves.

  “Shane. I just wanted to let him know I got here safely. Don’t worry. I used my phone card.”

  She stared at me blankly for a moment. “I wasn’t worried. You can call whomever you like.” She blinked, then shook her head. “Anyway. We should get going if we want to beat the traffic over the bridge.” She looked at me expectantly; her eyes businesslike and efficient, the hint of openness I had seen the night before had vanished. “Is that what you’re wearing?”

  I had pulled on my traveling jeans and a slightly wrinkled embroidered peasant blouse. I glanced down at them. “Yeah,” I said, the heat rising to my skin. I couldn’t believe she was starting to criticize me already. “Is that okay with you?”

  She shrugged. “Of course it is. I only meant you wouldn’t have time to change. We need to go.” She tugged at her gloves. “Your hair looks nice up like that.”

  I touched my upswept ponytail. “Thank you,” I said, with an unsuccessful attempt to keep the surprise from my voice. I never knew what to expect from my mother. I could never read her intentions the way I could with other people. The way I could with Jenny. I took a deep breath and followed my mother out the door, hoping the sister I had neglected for so long wouldn’t turn me away.

  • • •

  The Wellman Institute perched like a boulder at the top of Capitol Hill, looking down over the downtown corridor of I-5. It was an imposing structure, square and sturdy, its faded brick facade strewn with ivy, its windows barred and closed. Spotty gray clouds moved over the morning sun, creating black ghosts that waltzed across the perfectly manicured lawn.

  We pulled into the visitors’ parking lot a few minutes before nine. A pointed crown of Douglas firs guarded the property like frozen soldiers; beneath them, thick rows of what must have been an abundant crop of daffodils hung their heads low, their petals pale and bruised. They looked how I felt.

  When my mother got out of the car, I sat in the front seat, hands gripping my knees, trying to control my breathing. It will be fine, I told myself. I can handle this. I am a grown woman. Jenny needs me. I had repeated this mantra all night long. Unable to sleep, I had lain stiff in my childhood bed, overwhelmed by the enormity of my decision to come. Why hadn’t I waited a day? Given it more thought? My therapist’s training told me the answer to this: thinking was what had allowed me to stay away all these years. Reasoning and remembering, analyzing and rationalizing; these were the mental weapons I had brandished in defense of my behavior. Not thinking, allowing my instincts to finally take over, was what brought me home.

  “Nicole?” My mother rapped at the window, startling me out of my thoughts. “Are you coming?”

  I nodded. “Yes.” I followed her into the building using the same heavily swinging metal doors I had escaped through a decade before. The stinging scent of ammonia did little to mask the cloud of stale human waste in the air. My eyes watered.

  “You’d think they’d open a window or something,” I commented after we signed in at the front desk and stepped into an elevator.

  “They couldn’t use the air-conditioning then,” my mother said, reaching into her purse and handing me a couple of Altoids. “Here. These help a little.”

  I popped them into my mouth. “Thanks.” The elevator’s joints creaked with age. “What floor is she on?”

  “Four. Dr. Leland told me he’d meet us in her room.”

  “And he’s her gynecologist?”

  My mother whipped her head around to look at me. “Jenny doesn’t have a gynecologist. Dr. Leland is her case supervisor. He’s been here almost as long as she has, overseeing all her meds and physical therapy, things like that.”

  “Do you like him?”

  She shrugged. “I’ve never really thought about it. Jenny smiles at him, though, so he can’t be too bad.”

  I smiled myself. Jenny’s smile was like a blessing. The greatest gift because you knew she could not fake it.

  When the elevator doors opened, the moaning hit me—the aching sounds of communication for those who had no words. We walked slowly down the hall where the beige walls were lined with women and girls in various stages of undress, sitting in their wheelchairs or on the floor, their limbs twisted in odd angles away from their bodies. Many stared ahead, unblinking, unseeing, but an older woman in a wheelchair slammed her open palm against her forehead again and again, muttering and spitting as her other hand waved haphazardly in the air beside her. A nurse stepped over to her, reaching for the woman’s arms. “Hush now, Connie,” the nurse soothed. “You’re all right. Everything’s okay.” It was gratifying to see such a prompt response to a patient’s needs. I wondered briefly where this nurse had been while Jenny was being raped.

  The smell was worse here than downstairs; I sucked hard on the mints in my mouth. Despite the foul odor, the surroundings at least seemed clean: the confetti-speckled linoleum was polished to a glossy shine, and if not completely dressed, the patients themselves weren’t covered in vomit or their own waste the way I’d always feared. Still, I was uncomfortable, even if these walls didn’t appear as sinister as I’d made them out to be.

  My mother moved forward purposefully down the hallway, opening a pale green door marked HUNTER, JENNIFER. I steeled myself and followed her, eyes to the floor, ashamed, afraid that my sister would not know me, that the years I had been gone might have changed everything between us.

  “Mrs. Hunter, hello,” a deep voice said, and I looked up to see a black man with short graying hair. His stocky build suggested that at one time he might have been a wrestler. “This is your other daughter, I presume?” he inquired, sticking out his hand.

  “Nicole Hunter,” I said as I stepped forward to shake his hand. I glanced around the small, square room that was painted the same beige as the hallway. Across from the bed and dresser there was a TV-VCR combo and a small stereo; otherwise, the only furniture was a chair by the window. Jenny stood next to it, her back to me. She could walk, but just barely. Her gait was unsteady, a jerky, uneven movement that threatened her balance with each step she attempted. Since she was eight years old we had had a wheelchair for her, but I knew it was important that she get a chance to stand on her own whenever she could. Perhaps in the same way it is important for us all.

  “Jenny, look who’s here,” Dr. Leland said as he stepped around the bed and over to my sister. He gently rotated her to face me. I barely recognized her. Her glorious chestnut hair, once long and shiny, had been shorn just above her shoulders, its waves choppy and dull. She seemed huge, at least fifty pounds heavier than when I had seen her last, a substantial gain on her petite four-and-a-half-foot frame. In a shapeless purple housedress, she was a swollen version of the angel I remembered. Her face, once heart-shaped like our mother’s, was doughy and round. Her chin had virtually disappeared beneath soft flesh. I searched her blue eyes for a hint of the sparkle I remembered so well from our childhood, but found only the distorted reflection of my own face. Still, she looked at me intently, recognition rising slowly in her expression. Her twisted, callused hands patted together in a silent rhythm. My bottom lip quivered and my heart shook as I hugged her to me. My chin still rested perfectly on top of her head; my body remembered holding her this way. She smelled of sweat and talcum powder.

  “Jenny,” I whispered. “Hi, sweetie.” I pulled back but kept my hands on her shoulders. She stared at me, her eyes blinking rapidly, as though she could not believe whom she was seeing. “I’m so happy to see you!” I said, reaching out to tuck her hair behind her ears. It was greasy to the touch. I used the corner of my shirt to wipe away the drool that ran a small river down her chin. “There, that’s better.”

>   Jenny’s face froze suddenly, and her indigo eyes flashed in anger. She slammed her fists together once, twice, then let out an aggravated yell. “Ahhh!” she exclaimed, driving her gaze into me like a knife. Her entire body shook with effort.

  “I know,” I soothed. “I know you’re mad. You should be. But I’m here now.” I leaned in and held her again. She was rigid against me, a low groan resonating from somewhere deep within her. “I heard you,” I whispered into her ear so Dr. Leland and our mother wouldn’t hear me. “I came because you said you needed help.”

  Her body relaxed at these words, and in a gesture of long-forgotten affection, Jenny rubbed her face against my sweater. When she pushed herself away, she looked up at me with a gooey grin, her eyes glowing. Sister. The word warmed my heart. I could not believe I had stayed away from her for so long. Every minute of my life in San Francisco seemed a waste in comparison to the feelings that filled me in that moment of reunion.

  My mother stood by the door watching our encounter, her expression soft around the edges. “I’ve told Nicole about Jenny’s condition,” she said to Dr. Leland, who had lowered himself into the chair by Jenny’s bed.

  I kept my arm around my sister, glancing down at her belly. “How far along is she?”

  “We think twenty weeks,” Dr. Leland said.

  “Twenty?” I gasped. “How could that have happened?” I had thought she’d be a month, maybe two. Not five, not more than halfway through the pregnancy. Jenny swayed next to me from side to side, her hands patting together gently again. She stared intently at Dr. Leland.

  The doctor looked over to my mother, who gestured with a flutter of her hand that he should go ahead and explain. Dr. Leland turned to me, leaned forward with his pointed elbows on his knees, fingers tented against each other. “Jenny has been on Depo-Provera for several years. You know what that is?”

  I nodded impatiently. “Yes. The birth control shot that keeps you from getting your period at all.”

  “Right. Pretty much. Most girls here who haven’t had hysterectomies are on it, mostly for the sake of the staff.”

  “How nice for them,” I commented snidely.

  “Well, Miss Hunter, it’s certainly less messy.” Annoyance flashed across his face. “Anyway, about six months ago, your mother expressed concern about all the weight Jenny had put on since being on the shot, so we took her off it. And since a normal side effect of Depo is missed periods even for a few months after it’s been discontinued, Jenny’s condition went unnoticed.”

  “Until now,” I said pointedly.

  “Yes, until now. When she missed her fourth period, one of the nurses felt her belly and suspected the pregnancy. We did the blood test yesterday.”

  I wondered if Jenny had already known she was pregnant or if the nurses had told her yesterday and this was what prompted her to call me for help. I looked at my mother. “How often do you visit her? Couldn’t you tell?”

  “How?” she said defensively. “She’d put on all that weight …”

  Dr. Leland stood and pressed down the air in front of him with his hands. “There’s no one to blame here. It went unnoticed. Now we need to figure out what to do with her.”

  “No one to blame?” I was incensed. “What about the bastard who did it to her? What about this institute, for hiring him? Haven’t you heard of a little thing called background checks?”

  “Of course, Miss Hunter.” Dr. Leland’s voice was low and smooth. “Jacob Zimmerman checked out perfectly. He’d worked in several institutions similar to this one and came with high recommendations. There was nothing we could have done.”

  “Nothing you could have done?” I repeated, my tone rising angrily.

  “Nicole,” my mother said, moving over to stand next to Jenny on her other side. “Please.”

  I shot her an angry look, trying to slow the quick beat of my heart. Nothing we could have done. Watching my father walk into Jenny’s room. There was something I could have done then. I could have screamed. I could have told. Told someone, anyone who might listen. But instead, I was silent. A child terrified. Not anymore.

  I straightened my spine, pulled my shoulders back. “Someone is responsible for this, Dr. Leland. I assume you’ve contacted the police?”

  “Of course. They’re looking for Mr. Zimmerman as we speak.” He walked over to help my mother, who was maneuvering Jenny into the chair he had just vacated. Her small body shuddered as they lowered her into the seat, uncertain where she might land. Dr. Leland gently laid his hand on my sister’s head and spoke again. “What concerns us now is what to do about Jenny’s condition. Your mother wants her to have the baby.”

  “What?” I exclaimed. My jaw dropped. “Isn’t abortion legal until twenty-two weeks?”

  “Twenty-four weeks here in Washington,” Dr. Leland corrected me. “One of our doctors could perform the procedure. Today, even, if your mother will sign the paperwork.” His tone was suggestive, and his brown eyes gazed at her expectantly. Obviously, they’d already had this conversation.

  My mother folded and unfolded her hands, chin down to her chest. “I won’t,” she said softly.

  “What?” I exploded. “Are you crazy? She can’t have this baby, Mother.”

  She raised her eyes to me defiantly. “And why not? She’s carried it this long. Maybe she wants the baby. Did you ever think of that?” She held her head high on her graceful neck, though the pale skin on her chest flushed red, as it always had, with the stress of confrontation.

  “That’s ridiculous and you know it.”

  Dr. Leland strode to the door. “I’ll leave you two alone to discuss this. Tell the charge nurse to page me if you arrive at a decision.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Leland,” my mother said, kneeling down next to Jenny. My sister had been watching our exchange with hawk-like intent, the same way she used to watch our parents fight: eyes wide, not blinking, drinking their words like a man taking in water at the end of a desert journey. My mother rested a light hand on Jenny’s belly. “Everything’s fine,” she said, and I could not tell whom she was assuring, the baby or her own daughter.

  I dropped on the bed next to them, leaned back on my hands. The patchwork quilt beneath me was soft, comforting against my skin. My mother must have brought it from home. I quickly scanned the room and noticed several other personal touches: a small pile of stuffed animals, two bright Monet prints, and a substantial library of Sesame Street videos. At least Jenny was surrounded by her favorite things. I redirected my attention to our mother. “What are you going to do, Mom, raise the baby yourself?”

  “No,” she said, her voice faltering, then looked at me with sad eyes. “I don’t know what I’m going to do. But it’s just not right. This baby is alive. I can’t be responsible for killing it.”

  “You wouldn’t be.”

  “Yes, I would. I’m Jenny’s guardian, so it’s my decision whether this baby lives or dies. If it dies, I’m the one who made it happen.” She shook her head. “I won’t do it.” She stood up, giving emphasis to her words.

  I threw my hands up in the air. “Then what the hell did you want me here for, if you’ve already made up your mind?”

  Her eyes lit up with tears, looking to Jenny and then back to me. “You’re her sister, Nicole. I thought she might need you.”

  Jenny let out a tiny happy squeak, smiling at me again. I sighed, realizing I wouldn’t convince Mom to change her mind so quickly. But then, the seed of an idea began to take root in my mind: a solution, a redemption. Something I could finally do to make up for what I hadn’t done all those years before. “All right,” I said. “Fine. But then we’re going to get her out of here.”

  My mother’s thin, dark eyebrows lifted into small tents toward her hairline. “And take her where?”

  “Home, Mom. I want to take her home.”

  • • •

  After a long day of fruitless discussion at Wellman, I consented to leave Jenny at the institute one more night. Whispering in
my sister’s ear before my mother and I left, I promised her I’d do everything I could to be back the next day to get her.

  As we sat down to eat at the small, round kitchen table, my mother and I continued to argue. “You’ve never taken care of someone like that,” she said. “You don’t know how much it takes out of you.”

  I set my fork down next to my bowl, its contents cold and untouched. My stomach was whirling with emotion; the idea of adding soggy spaghetti to it was enough to cause a small gag in the back of my throat. “I watched it drain the life right out of you,” I said.

  Her eyes closed and her chin shot upward at this remark, as though someone had caught her with a sharp right hook. She lowered her jaw and looked at me with watery eyes. “When did you get to be so cruel?”

  My chest tightened with guilt. Strange how I could be so angry with her and yet feel such remorse when I hurt her. “Sorry,” I said, pushing my bowl to the center of the table. “It’s just … I guess I don’t understand why you want her to have this baby, Mom. It seems like you’d be putting Jenny through an awful lot—”

  “She’s already been through an awful lot!” Mom snapped, interrupting me, slamming her fork to the table. I jumped at the noise, taken aback by her forcefulness.

  “Having an abortion is not as simple as it sounds,” she continued in a quieter tone.

  “I know,” I said. “It just seems that it would provide a quicker solution than letting her go through with the pregnancy.”

  Mom stared at me, her expression deep and thoughtful. “Just because a solution is quick doesn’t mean the consequences don’t stick with you.”

  Her point hit home. I thought of my hurried departure ten years before, how the consequences of choosing to build a life without my family had left me feeling empty, uncertain about my career and living with a man I wasn’t sure was right for me. Contentment seemed to elude me; just when I thought I might turn a corner and catch it, it vanished. I readied for confrontation on this subject with my mother. “I left because I couldn’t stand to see her in that place,” I said defensively. “And yes, the consequences stuck with me. They’re still sticking with me.” My tone stepped up an octave. “I’m positively sticky with guilt, okay?” I made my voice hard, demanding.