If You Knew My Sister Page 2

  3

  The last time Elle found me was in the emergency department of the hospital where I used to work. I watched from the safety of a first-floor window as she fought her way across the car park. When she landed a punch on the cheek of the nurse who was trying to restrain her, a colleague of mine joked about how one of the psych patients must have escaped. I laughed along, added in a few snide comments of my own about the way she was dressed. Just for the record, Elle was wearing a season-inappropriate woollen jumper. It was oozing out from underneath the cuffs and collar of what looked like a school shirt, which she had buttoned incorrectly over the top. Hot pants. Doc Marten boots. Dressed as if she was on her way to a rave in the thick of winter. It was June, and the sun was bright. She called out to me, her flailing arms trying to reach me as the nurse buckled at her side. Security ended up tackling her to the ground, pulling her across the car park, ripping her shirt. They couldn’t take any risks because of the kitchen knife she was gripping in her hand.

  She never did get to speak to me that day. But she knew I was there. I could feel it as my skin contracted across my body, as her eyes met the glass behind which I was standing. I had handed in my request for a transfer by the time I left for home, and for the next six years I ran as far away as I could. Little good it did me.

  Because now here I am, in spite of everything I know about Elle, going back to find her. I called into Queen’s College Hospital on the way to the airport, organised three days of emergency leave. I didn’t tell them that the emergency is mine.

  I sit down in seat 28A, pulling my seat belt tight across my lap. The tiny cabin begins to shake as we rattle our way up the runway, and I feel my stomach turn as we leave the ground. I make a last-minute wish that the wing will buckle, or that we will fall from the sky in a devastating, newsworthy incident. But my wish isn’t granted. Instead we climb up and up, London a city in miniature below, until we stutter into a thick layer of grey cloud.

  In my bag I have two changes of clothes, a pack of cigarettes, an unmarked bottle of Valium, which I snatched from the hospital this morning, and a book I know I won’t read. I snap the top off the bottle and flick one of the tablets to the back of my mouth, washing it down with a brandy. The medley of narcotics would be enough to knock some people out, but I am accustomed to it. Perhaps being an anaesthetist I have more courage when it comes to self-medication. It’s only with my family that I am weak. The Valium gets to work, taking the edge off the fear to the point that I stop grinding my teeth.

  I pull out my phone and scroll through the messages, realising that I have missed one from Antonio. I press the envelope icon and the message pops open.

  Have a safe flight. Let me know when you land. Ti amo, A x

  I was attending a conference about pain management when I met him. He was serving dinner, handing out bread rolls, leaving a trail of crumbs. In those first blissful weeks I had no idea about the sedate girlfriend he was hiding. Then she found out about me and threw him out while I waited in the car outside. That very same day he moved in with me, talked about what a relief it was to be free. He made it sound like his dreams were coming true, but in hindsight he had nowhere else to go. I couldn’t believe how easily I took it, or how understanding I was. But lying in bed with his naked legs draped over mine allowed me to forget about my past, pretend that life started only then. I felt consumed by him. With Antonio I felt like I stopped existing. But that was a good thing; I didn’t have to be me any more, poor old lonely Irini. Irini turned into us. I belonged to us. So, he had played me along a bit. Big deal. It wasn’t like he had done anything comparable to what my family had done to me. And besides, he wanted me.

  It was lucky we met in an Elle-free period, because it gave us the freedom to live our lives, as simple as they were with our shared love of nature documentaries and his home-cooked food. For the best part of two years I didn’t even tell him that I had a sister, and living in that lie was bliss. Once I had him, I stopped needing her.

  It was after a trip to Italy to meet his family that he started talking about marriage and kids. I refused. What kind of mother would I make when I had never had one of my own from whom to learn? We’ve been falling apart ever since. In fact, those final days of our lazy Italian summer, curled up on the same lounger, watching the sun dip beneath the horizon, were the last I can remember where we resembled something based on happiness.

  At first I thought he was going to leave. But he stayed, cried, said he couldn’t be without me. It was a relief, because I wasn’t sure that I could be without him either; what would I do on my own? Disappearing into my books and work was an option, but I had done that before and knew the emptiness it held. I had tasted connection with Antonio, and I knew that even a flimsy attachment to him was sweeter than isolation. I didn’t want to be Irini again, the girl with no family and no friends.

  But now everything is changing, like we’re rotting, getting moth-eaten. I am slowly becoming Irini again, and the union that I have been hiding behind is disappearing. He doesn’t understand my decision to exclude marriage and kids from our future, and I can’t admit to him that actually I want a family too. Because even to want it feels dangerous. I can’t tell him the truth, so I throw the phone back into my bag and order another brandy.

  The plane touches down to unnecessary applause and I stand, hobble forward, my hip sore from the awkward position. I can feel the nerves growing as I get ever closer to reunion, the nausea in my stomach, the slight difficulty in breathing. I remind myself that the trip will be short, that I will stay in a hotel, and that I only have to turn up at the funeral. I tell myself that I chose to come here. That I won’t even have to see Elle alone if I don’t want to. Last-minute bargaining with my nerves and memories. Sense bubbling to the surface. But as I walk through customs, I see her waiting at the gate, even though I haven’t told her what flight I am on.

  I realise that her appearance has changed during these latest years of absence, and despite my dry throat and sweaty palms I allow myself to hope that it’s an indication things can be different. Before, there was always an outrageousness about her presence, an inability to conform to the ideals of society, physically or mentally. Everybody could see it. The rave gear outside the hospital was just one example. But now she appears refined, her hair neat and blonde, cut in a sharp bob. Tight sporty clothes hug her lithe frame, and she is clutching a bottle of Evian water. There are pearls the size of marbles in her ears, so big and dull they could be carved-up chunks of bone. An active Stepford wife, perhaps with two perfectly turned-out kids, a casserole in the oven, and the courtesy to wipe her mouth like a lady when she has finished sucking you off. Could she be different? Is that a smile I can see? She has the appearance of somebody who is connected, who actually sees what the rest of the world sees when she looks in the mirror. The only thing that hasn’t changed is the triangular pink scar on her forehead. Neither of us scars very well. Bad healers.

  I find myself wondering who Elle really is beneath the surface. Superficially she is everything I am not. She walks with her head held high, whereas I have the remnants of a limp that gets worse when it’s cold, thanks to a dysplastic hip. She is slim; in comparison I am verging on chubby. The only exception is my left thigh, which refuses to develop even with all the attention it gets. Antonio always makes an effort with it when we have sex, kissing and stroking it, gliding his hands over the wrinkly skin like it’s one of my erogenous zones. It is not. Perhaps it’s to remind me that I am a cripple, that I should be grateful for his love and therefore make more of an effort when he asks me to marry him. No man would dare do such a thing with Elle.

  But as I get close, I see her jaw tightly clenched, her teeth set. It wasn’t a smile I saw, and I watch as her unblinking eyes search the crowd. I pick up my pace and slip around the barriers, swallowing down the lump in my throat. Elle spots me, her eyes locked on her target as she pushes past a woman with a crying toddler, knocking into the pushchair. She tuts, the way adults
without children do in order to shame parents when their child has unintentionally annoyed. It is a reminder of her unapologetic certainty that, unlike me, she has never once doubted who she is. That confidence is captivating, and I realise that nothing has changed. She might look different, but she is still Elle. And this reminds me that there is only one thing of which I can be sure when it comes to my sister: she is the one person who never tired of trying to find me.

  At first I made it easy for her. A simple change to my phone number, a new address in the same town. Being alone was hard, and despite what happened to make me run from her at the age of eighteen, to know she was searching for me felt good. So I started to test her by raising the stakes with false trails and dead ends, forcing her to prove her resolve more and more each time. The knowledge that she was searching for me was narcotic, and I was addicted. Oh, to be wanted. What a joy it is. Yet the only thing worse than her absence was her presence.

  ‘I wondered how long you were going to make me wait,’ she announces. ‘I’ve been here since I got your message.’ She looks me up and down, sizing me up, her jaw still tight, her lips drawn into a sickly grin. I smile, try to look friendly, and like I haven’t been avoiding her for most of my life.

  ‘I haven’t been here long. I just spotted you,’ I say, fiddling with the handle of my brown tote, not yet able to make full eye contact. Then she reaches forward, unexpectedly taking me in her arms. I wobble towards her on my dodgy left hip and catch a middle-aged man with a swollen gut smiling at us, enjoying our reunion. Elle spots him too and makes a bigger effort, pulling me tighter, throwing off little breathy sounds of contentment like a purring cat. My cheek brushes against her cold neck, and a shiver runs down my spine. Her fake smile is instant when she realises there is an audience to please. Then she pulls back, slips an arm around me and begins drawing me in her direction. I try to tell myself that her grip isn’t any tighter than it needs to be, but I can already feel my self-confidence flapping, like the storm-torn sail of a boat, ragged and good for nothing.

  You chose to come, I remind myself. You want the truth. But what next? Five minutes here and I am already falling under her spell, following her blindly as she leads me away. By tomorrow, who am I going to be?

  ‘Look at you,’ she says, her words thick with false sentiment as we move towards the exit. ‘You got so fat!’ She says it with such enthusiasm, and even nibbles at my cheeks with her perfectly manicured fingertips. She pulls my bag from my hand and I offer no resistance. She pushes through the crowd, coercing me along behind her.

  We step outside into a strong wind and my eyes begin to water. I dab at the corners with the back of my hand. I stop, forcing her to stop too. ‘Elle, before we go any further, I have to ask you something.’

  But it’s like she doesn’t hear me. ‘It’s been too long,’ she says, turning to look at me. She swallows hard and for a moment I think she is about to cry. I feel a pang of sympathy, guilt even. But I know this is one of her tricks, the ability she has to make me think that she needs me.

  I try again. ‘Elle,’ I say quietly, knowing that if I don’t ask now, the strength to do so will disappear. ‘How did she die?’

  Elle stares back at me with a glint in her cold, ice-blue eyes. She takes hold of my hand and slides her fingers through mine, like she might have done when I was a child if we had ever been given the chance to be sisters. I feel the pressure as she secures her grip. She says nothing at all as she leads me across the car park, a left-sided sneer inching on and off her face. I am sure her silence is proof of her guilt, and I can feel what’s left of my confidence slipping away.

  And I realise what is happening here. All those years without Elle have allowed me to forget who I really am. I pretend to be somebody other than that little girl who was abandoned. But now that we are reunited, I exist. I came here for the truth, and now, within minutes of being with Elle, I have the first part of it: I will always be that little girl, the one they decided they didn’t want. It doesn’t matter how hard I fight it, or how I lie and tell myself my relationship with Antonio is everything I need.

  I think of all those times I have run from Elle, trying to get away to finally be myself. All that time with Antonio thinking that we had found something good, that I had been completed by him and had finally said goodbye to poor Peg Leg Irini. Years of study to become a doctor, a mask so people wouldn’t see the real me. All that wasted time. I can already feel Elle slipping back into the cracks of my life like a poison, filling me up, making me whole. I want to cry as I watch the sharp cut of her bobbed hair slash like a knife with each step she takes. Because now I realise that there was only ever one person I have the right to be. Me, the unwanted little girl, just as I existed from birth.

  4

  Elle hands me my bag as we climb into the bullet-grey E-class Mercedes, taking cover from the harsh Scottish wind. She turns the key and a chorus of operatic music screams through the speakers as the engine roars into life. She reaches for the CD player, sinking us into silence. Inside it is cold, even with the heaters on full, and the air is blasting at my face, squeezing out tears. I sit like an idiot in the passenger seat, with no clue what to say because she still hasn’t answered my question.

  ‘Elle,’ I say quietly, my voice apologetic as I brush my fringe from my eyes. ‘I asked you to tell me how she died.’

  She fastens her seat belt, adjusts the tension across her chest as if I haven’t spoken. ‘Shall I take you to have a look at her?’ she asks, scrutinising the dials and levers with the same care with which a pilot might check a cockpit before takeoff. ‘I think it would be nice for you to meet her,’ she suggests, her smile sickly and her stare vacant. ‘The little butterfly returning to the nest after all these years.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ I say with a quick shake of the head, my eyes wide and nervous. I’ve felt like this before, moments as a teenager when I wasn’t sure where Elle was leading me. She continues to test the wipers, even though it’s not raining. They flop across the windscreen, thwack, schweep, thwack, schweep, before she adds in a squirt of foamy green water. I look back at Departures as she pulls away, gazing at the passengers who are travelling somewhere new, smiles and laughter all over their faces. ‘Why would I want to see her body? Especially when you won’t even tell me how she died.’

  ‘She just died, all right? Dead. She is D E A fucking D. What else could you possibly need to know?’ She sighs. ‘So where do you want to go if you don’t want to see our dead mother?’ It is as if we are bargaining between a visit to Costa or Starbucks. She glides on to the nearest motorway, heading towards the English border, test-perfect control of the car despite her frustration.

  The open green space of the countryside seems endless, with only sporadic views of the elevated castle and the grand clock tower of the Balmoral Hotel flashing through weaker sections of hedgerow. I could cope there, I think, swallowed up by concrete and crowds, despite the memories I have with Elle in this city. But the countryside is like the open ocean, deep and vast, unbreachable. As though there is no escape. ‘If you don’t want to see her, let’s do something together.’ She pats my leg like a mother might to offer a child gentle encouragement. Like I saw Aunt Jemima do once to one of her own children, the children who, she liked to remind me, had always been part of their plans. But all it does is make me shiver, tense up. I feel as tight as a coiled spring.

  ‘I want to go to a hotel,’ I say, trying to sound confident, trying to remember the person I have endeavoured to be in the years leading up to this moment. I want to take a bath and sleep. Smoke a bit, drink some wine. Chew a few Valium. That would really help. Anything that doesn’t involve Elle will help. But her silence in the wake of my request is unnerving, and it makes my attempt at certainty feel like bad judgement. I can see now that I shouldn’t have come here. ‘Something close by. Whatever hotel you think,’ I add nervously, an unconvincing attempt to cushion the impact of my certitude.

  Without glancing at her wa
tch she says, ‘It’s only five past five. What are you going to do in a hotel at this time of day when we have only just reconciled after,’ and she turns to look me straight in the eye as we drive at eighty miles per hour along the motorway, ‘six years? The only place you are going is with me.’ It’s enough to let me know that I am not the only one who harbours mixed emotions, pent-up feelings that for the sake of politeness remain hidden.

  ‘I’m tired from the flight,’ I maintain, but even as I say it I know I have lost this argument. She has waited six long years to see me again. It was easier for both of us when I was younger. I was always more willing back then. But who isn’t when they are only thirteen?

  That’s how old I was when Elle first turned up unannounced, despite our parents’ best efforts to keep us apart. She walked into my life a hero, saved me from Robert Kneel and his band of bullies. How he regretted making me his target that day after she had finished with him. Then there were the late-night trips to the park when Aunt Jemima thought I was asleep in bed, the shoplifting Elle did on my behalf. The alcohol she bought for me, and her tentative care when I puked it all back up.

  ‘Well, you will not be staying at a hotel,’ she says, spittle flying, her patience exhausted. I know what she is going to say. She means for me to stay with her, at the house. My almost family home. But to stay in the place that could never have been my home is unthinkable. A joke. ‘Besides, we live in the middle of nowhere. There are no hotels. You will be staying at the house with me.’ I open my mouth to protest, but I am pathetically powerless. It’s like I’m driftwood caught on a wave, at the mercy of the sea. She just pats my leg again, her composure regained, and we continue our drive in silence. I can’t believe how easy I have made it for her this time.