The Language of Sisters: A Novel Read online

  She looked bewildered, then a little annoyed. “I wasn’t talking about you, Nicole, however much that may surprise you.”

  I felt appropriately chastised, realizing that in the short time I’d been home, I’d made more than one false assumption regarding her intentions. But I was a little annoyed myself, feeling once again that I had to drag what my mother was thinking from her.

  When she didn’t go on, I asked, “Then who were you talking about?”

  Placing her elbows on the table, she let her forehead fall against folded hands. “Me,” she said. The sound was more a breath than a word.

  It was my turn to look bewildered. “What about you?”

  She didn’t look up, but instead spoke to the surface of the table as though it were a priest to whom she was making confession. “My abortion.” If her voice had been any quieter I wouldn’t have heard her at all.

  My jaw dropped. “What? When?”

  “You were six months old. I didn’t think I could have another child so soon … ” She trailed off, then took another deep breath before continuing, still not looking at me. “You think you’re sticky with guilt.” With this, she lifted her gaze to me, her thin lips pressed into a grim line.

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “So you don’t want Jenny to have an abortion because you feel guilty about yours?” Her reluctance made a little more sense now, though I wasn’t sure if it justified putting my sister through the strain of pregnancy and childbirth.

  She shook her head. “No. But what if she feels the same connection to her baby that I felt to mine when it was still inside me?” She swallowed. “Before I killed it.”

  “You didn’t kill it, Mom.” I recognized my own melodramatic nature in her words and had the sudden urge to shower in order to wash off the similarity.

  Her dark head bobbed insistently. “Yes, I did. I felt that baby’s life inside me the same way I felt your life inside me, and I made the decision to end it.” Her green eyes were pleading. “If Jenny has any sense of that baby’s life, I will not be the one to take it from her.”

  We were quiet for a moment, both absorbed in our separate thoughts. I considered the significance of what she had revealed. “Okay,” I said. “But why didn’t you just tell me this at the hospital?”

  “We’ve barely spoken for ten years,” she said flatly, her eyes dark with restrained emotion. “The fact that you had an abortion isn’t exactly something you share with a casual acquaintance. Even if she is your daughter.”

  It seemed I wasn’t the only person at the table capable of cruelty. My bottom lip quivered unexpectedly at the severity of her words, and as I averted my eyes from her gaze, I found myself having to blink back an onslaught of tears. I stared hard at the yellow birdhouse-patterned wallpaper that had hung in this kitchen for as long as I could remember.

  She was right, of course. We were hardly more than strangers. And suddenly I realized how terrible that was, how much I had missed having her in my life. I felt her eyes on me, expectant, but I still couldn’t look at her. I certainly wasn’t prepared to share what I was feeling, so I decided instead to try to set aside the issues we had with each other in order to figure out what was best for Jenny. “So, okay,” I said, finally. “Jenny is going to have this baby.” I paused, turning my head to look at her. “Then she should come home.”

  She leaned back against her chair. Sighing, she tucked her hair behind both ears and held her hands there as though she didn’t want to hear any more. “I have to work, Nicole. I couldn’t do it.”

  “But you wouldn’t be doing it,” I said stubbornly, crossing my arms over my chest. “I would.” I swung one arm around the room in a wide circle. “She knows this house. It’s still set up for her: the bathroom, her bedroom, the ramp on the back porch. You wouldn’t have to do anything. I’d do it all.” My voice shook under the weight of this promise, unsure whether I actually had what it took to follow through. I spoke purely on instinct, allowing my feelings, not my intellect, to guide my words.

  She looked at me skeptically, her chin to her chest. “You have no idea what you’d be taking on.”

  “Maybe not, but you asked me to come because Jenny might need me.” I held my hands out to her, open-palmed. “So let me at least do something.” I had a difficult time understanding how my mother could be so adamant about Jenny having the child and hedge so much about bringing her home. It seemed I was offering her the perfect solution.

  “What about your job?” she countered. “Can you afford to take so much time off?”

  “Another baker is picking up my shifts. It’s no big deal.” This was true, I realized, and a little bit sad to think I was so easily replaced. I suddenly felt insignificant.

  She sighed. “I still can’t believe you left your practice. Your grandmother didn’t leave you an education fund to have you throw it away like that.”

  I felt compelled to defend myself. “I’m not throwing anything away. I’m trying out a different career.” I didn’t mention that I had been extremely thrifty with my education fund; I was still living off its remains. It was the financial cushion that had made my coming home possible. I stood up from the table, fingers splayed across its surface. “You’re trying to change the subject. We need to make a decision here. I want to bring Jenny home.”

  She still looked hesitant, so I tried another tack. “Do me a favor, okay? Just think about it. Don’t decide tonight. Sleep on it and see how you feel in the morning.”

  “Okay,” she agreed. Her eyes were tired. She stood as well, and we both retreated to our respective rooms, waiting silently for morning to come.

  • • •

  When I woke, the house was still quiet. I ventured into the dark hallway to call Shane before I talked to my mother. This time I caught him at home.

  “Hey, babe,” he said. “How’d it go with your sister?”

  I fingered the springy telephone cord, smiling. “Pretty well, all things considered.” I gave him a brief synopsis of the visit, then told him of my plan to stay and take care of Jenny until the baby was born.

  He was quiet for a moment, then spoke. “You’re staying four more months?”

  I held my breath tightly in my chest. “I can’t just leave her, Shane.”

  “What about your mom? She’s the one who wants Jenny to have the baby, right? She should be the one to take care of her.”

  “I know. And I’m sure once Jenny is home the maternal instinct thing will kick back into full force and we’ll take care of Jenny together.” As I said this, I realized my insistence on bringing Jenny home was hinged on this belief: that once I got my sister here, Mom would spring back into the caretaker I remembered and help me. All she needed was a little prodding.

  Shane was quiet until I spoke again. “Shane?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Are you mad?” I asked, incredulous.

  He sighed. “No.”

  “You sound mad.”

  “I’m not mad, Nicole. But you’re always saying how screwed up your family is and suddenly you’re back living with them instead of me.” He sounded like a child who wasn’t getting his way.

  “It’s not like I’m leaving forever.” I made sure my tone reflected the annoyance I felt.

  “Four months is a long time.”

  I sank to the floor, my back against the wall, the textured plaster scratching me through my thin cotton nightshirt. “So you’re saying our relationship is over if I stay?”

  “Of course not. Look, I have to get to work, okay? You do whatever you feel is right, I guess, and keep me posted.” I felt dismissed.

  “Okay, I will.” I paused. “How’s Mooch doing? Does he miss his mama?”

  Shane snorted. “He’s fine. Shedding all over everything, as usual.” Moochie was a husky–German shepherd mix; his thick coat made up almost half his body weight.

  “If you brush him it’s not so bad,” I counseled. Shane had a difficult time with anything disordered or messy; he was the ty
pe of person who washed, dried, and put away all his laundry in one afternoon. I, on the other hand, tended to wash the pile of clothes on the floor only when it looked like it might stand up and walk to the laundry room of its own volition.

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” Shane said, sounding as though he had no intention to do so. “Bye, babe.”

  “Bye.” I softly hung up the phone and looked up to see my mother standing there. Her smooth, dark bob was tousled from sleep. “How long have you been listening?” I asked, a little peeved she was sneaking around like I was a teenager again.

  “I wasn’t listening. Who’s Mooch?” She smiled guiltily, and I decided to forgive her eavesdropping.

  “He’s my dog. Shane’s not nuts about animals, so it’s a bit of a drama for him while I’m gone.”

  “Oh.” She stuck her hands into the side pockets of her sweatpants and leaned back against the wall.

  “So,” I said, pulling my knees up to my chest and hugging them with both arms. The worn carpet tickled the soles of my feet. “Did sleeping on it help at all?”

  She let her head fall toward one shoulder and then shrugged. “I’m not sure. I didn’t sleep much.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “Me, too.” She sighed. “I still don’t think it’s a good idea, Nicole. But if you’re determined … I did ask you to come.”

  “So …?” I prodded, rocking a bit on my tailbone.

  She crossed one ankle over the other, managing to look both defeated and frightened at once. “So … okay. Bring your sister home.”

  • • •

  The first few years after Jenny’s disabilities made themselves apparent in our lives I don’t remember very much of my everyday existence changing. I was a child, of course, self-absorbed in the innocent way children are, so I’m sure as I floated obliviously along, my parents were dealing with mind-bending emotional hurdles. But for the most part, Jenny’s disease didn’t make an enormous impact upon me until her screaming fits began. She was six when the first one hit, and these episodes quickly became the ticking bomb in our lives. From one moment to the next, we never knew when one might come, what invisible trigger would send my sister into agony so great we often thought she was dying right in front of us.

  The fits struck in varying degrees of intensity, but for some reason a particular evening the summer I turned eleven sticks out in my mind as being one of the worst. It was after dinner and I was in our front yard jumping rope in the warm dusk air when an astonishing screech erupted from our house. Then came another, and another. It was a shrill of the deepest distress, an anguished peal for help. I ran up the porch stairs and into the living room, where both my mother and father were kneeling in front of Jenny, who sat on the couch red-faced and crying. Her bottom lip sagged; her blue eyes were wild with fear. The muscles of her small body were tense and rigid, as if she were a volcano leaking lava, about to erupt.

  “What’s wrong with her?” my father demanded. He asked this every time Jenny began screaming, as if it were possible for my mother or me to know.

  Mom smoothed Jenny’s messy, dark hair, searching her child’s body for evidence of trauma. “I don’t know, Mark,” she said loudly as her daughter continued screaming. She cupped Jenny’s hot, wet face in her hands. “What’s wrong, honey? Are you hurt? Are you sick? Please, tell me.” Mom knew from experience that these questions were futile, but still she asked them, perhaps believing in some place in her heart that if asked enough times, her daughter just might answer.

  Instead, Jenny screeched again, raising her clenched fists and slamming them into her open, drooling mouth. Blood oozed from the marks her teeth had made. I stood frozen; my sister’s screams reached deep inside me, scratching at my soft, pulsing flesh. I wiggled in discomfort. “Mom, do something!”

  My father stooped and grabbed Jenny by the tops of her thin arms. “Stop it!” He shook her. Hard. Her head snapped forward and back on the top of her neck. “Stop it right now!” I turned my eyes away and began counting the bricks of the fireplace. I made a deal with myself: if I could count all of them without taking a breath, Dad wouldn’t hurt Jenny anymore. I had to exhale before I even got to twenty.

  “Mark, don’t,” Mom pleaded, pushing him away, still trying to soothe Jenny with her touch.

  “There’s nothing wrong with her, Joyce!” Dad bellowed, throwing his arms up in the air, disgusted. “She’s like a baby, wanting attention. You need to stop coddling her, dammit! This is why she should be in a home. They know how to handle these things. You don’t.”

  My mother’s eyes shot daggers at him, but she didn’t respond. It was an old argument, one neither of them planned to lose. My father stormed out the back door with his car keys and cigarettes in hand. Jenny’s screaming continued.

  We tried everything, my mother and I. We had to. Even though nothing had helped before, we couldn’t just listen to her scream. We sang to her, we tried food and water, we checked her diapers, laid her down, walked her around, and still she screamed. Mom held her arms down so Jenny wouldn’t slice her fingers to ribbons against her teeth. Being restrained only seemed to incense my sister more. The banging of her fists to her mouth seemed to give her relief, the same way punching a pillow or slamming a door made me feel better when I was angry.

  After three hours, my insides felt twisty and disoriented from the sound of my sister’s cries. As usual, she slowly petered out, resting her head on my mother’s belly as they swayed together in the living room. My mother’s exhaustion was written across her face in tear streaks and dark shadows. “Help me get her to bed, Nicole,” she whispered, and the two of us walked Jenny through the kitchen and down the hall to her bedroom, where finally, mercifully, she quieted and fell asleep.

  • • •

  Images of this night tumbled through my mind as I packed up my sister’s belongings at Wellman. I considered whether I was insane for wanting to take her to my mother’s house, to be utterly responsible for her needs over the next four months. And her needs were immense. Dr. Leland had fought me tooth and nail to keep Jenny at the institute, citing my sister’s medication schedule and extensive physical therapy needs. “Do you really think you can handle this?” he asked me as we stood on opposite sides of Jenny’s bed. “Do you think you’re qualified?”

  “I’m her sister,” I snapped. “I helped take care of her for fifteen years before she came here. I think that qualifies me.” I didn’t want to think about this. I only knew I had to do it. I looked over to Jenny, who sat quietly in her wheelchair by the door, watching me pack her things. I tried to send out only positive thoughts so she wouldn’t sense any of the hesitation I felt, any of the fear that I was making an enormous mistake.

  “Have you ever given her an enema, Nicole?” Dr. Leland inquired pointedly. I stopped packing for a moment and looked startled. He continued. “She needs one almost every day—did you know that? And what about the baby? Other than here, where are you going to find a doctor willing to take on a severely disabled mother?”

  “I’ll find one.” I hardened my gaze along with my determination. “If I were you, I wouldn’t be worrying about my sister’s enemas. I’d be worrying about what this institution’s lawyers are going to do when the media gets wind of what happened here.”

  “Miss Hunter, there’s no need—”

  “No need for what? To let the public know what really goes on in these places every day? What gets brushed under the rug because the victims don’t have voices?” My words shook with emotion. “Well, Dr. Leland, Jenny has a voice. She has my voice, and I intend to use it.”

  I sounded more confident than I felt. I didn’t actually have a plan to approach the media; I wanted to talk to Shane and get an idea of how stable our legal position was before I did anything.

  For the moment, all I knew for sure was that I was going to care for Jenny the way I should have when I was eighteen. How unfathomable it had been to me then—fresh out of high school, thrilled to escape the suffo
cating confines of my family—to drop the potential of my life and take care of my sister so my parents wouldn’t place her at Wellman. How much I tormented myself over leaving her there when I could have stood up to my father’s ultimatum: “Either commit her or I will leave you, Joyce.” How deeply I hated my mother for choosing a man over her own daughter, a man who ended up leaving her anyway. The life I’d created in San Francisco didn’t seem worth it now, after all the time I’d lost with Jenny, after what had ended up happening to her. Her pregnancy gave me the chance to finally redeem myself, to be the sister I wished I had been.

  When Dr. Leland realized I would not be swayed, he grudgingly handed over the names of a couple of obstetricians who had had some experience with special-needs patients. He also gave me a list and schedule of Jenny’s medications and informed me that any that might be harmful during pregnancy had already been discontinued.

  “Could the damage have already been done?” I asked.

  Dr. Leland gave a short nod. “Possibly. She wasn’t taking anything considered especially harmful to a fetus, but you’ll just have to wait and see.”

  I looked the list over. Zantac, for severe acid reflux, twice a day. Milk of magnesia, for constipation, as needed. Klonopin, for muscle spasms, once daily, with food. Dantrium, a muscle relaxant, as needed, with food. Instructions for giving an enema. I leaned over the back of Jenny’s wheelchair to kiss her cheek. “Quite the pharmacy, Sis. Don’t worry. We’ll figure it out.”

  I thanked Dr. Leland and wheeled my sister down the hall to the elevator and then to the car. My mother was waiting for us at the house, her disapproval of Jenny’s homecoming clear. As I loaded her few things into the trunk, Jenny closed her eyes and lifted her round chin, the soft spring sun on her pale face and dark hair like a graceful caress. She smiled, her closed hands patting their gentle dance. Her gaze caught mine and I smiled back into her deep blue eyes. Home, I thought, and she laughed, a sound so pure and clear it smoothed the edges of my ragged soul.