The Sisters Hemingway

by Annie England Noblin

  “See?” Pfeiffer said, shoving her glass into Hadley’s face. “I’m helping her.”

  Hadley pushed Pfeiffer away and stood up. “I’m going to bed,” she said. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

  “Aw, don’t be like that!” Pfeiffer called after her, but it was too late. Hadley was already upstairs and the slamming bedroom door was her response.

  “You shouldn’t push her buttons like that,” Martha said once they were alone. “You know how wound up she can get.”

  “She’s acting like our mother,” Pfeiffer replied, rolling her eyes. “And she’s not.”

  “She’s the closest thing we have now,” Martha said.

  “She pushes my buttons, too, ya know,” Pfeiffer continued. “It’s not like she’s innocent.”

  “It’s not a competition,” Martha reminded her, taking a sip of her Coke. “I think we all need to remember that we’re all we have left.” She glanced around the house. “This house is all we have left.”

  They’d all grown up in this house—this sprawling farmhouse on acres upon acres. It had been in their mother’s family for generations, and they’d lived there with her, and their father, and each other. And then, the August Pfeiffer was six, their father died.

  The way Pfeiffer remembered it, he’d been fine one day and dead the next. He’d been her blond, scruffy, farmer daddy and then he was gone. Of course, now she knew that her father had been sick for a long time—months, maybe even a whole year, before he died. It was cancer, first in his pancreas and then his liver. Then it was everywhere else, and one night her mother carried her into a hospital room to say good-bye.

  Pfeiffer had been scared. The man before her, tucked into the bed, didn’t look like her father. He was pale, skeletal, and worst of all, he was bald. Pfeiffer had seen her father only one other time without facial hair—when he’d shaved for church one Sunday morning. He came down the steps of the house and sauntered out to their truck so casually that she knew the man walking toward her had to be her father, but he didn’t look like her father, and so she began to cry. He’d held her in his arms and told her that he was, in fact, her daddy, her real daddy, and he promised her he’d never shave again.

  And he hadn’t. Until that night in the hospital. Now all of his hair was gone, on his head as well as his face, and Pfeiffer again cried. He’d motioned for her mother to bring her closer, despite her howling, and set her down on the bed beside him.

  “My best girl,” he’d said to her in his daddy voice. The voice he used just for her. “Don’t be scared.”

  “Matthew,” her mother said, gently chiding him. “You need to rest. We can come back.”

  But Matthew Hemingway shook his head and lifted his hand, now thin and frail, to the top of Pfeiffer’s head. “She’s all right, Rachael,” he said.

  In that moment, Pfeiffer had been all right. She stopped crying and curled up next to her father on the bed and fell asleep. She hadn’t woken even when her mother came to retrieve her sometime in the night, and by the next morning, her father was gone.

  After that, they continued to live on the farm, and her mother hired help from among the local men, usually Old Crow. Aunt Bea hadn’t come down for the funeral, instead sending that letter along with some money for the burial. She’d always been good to her niece and great-nieces in that way. She provided for the family when Rachael couldn’t, which was often after Matthew died.

  Their father hadn’t been from Cold River. Matthew Hemingway found his way to the small Ozarks town when he’d run out of gas on his way from Memphis, Tennessee, to Springfield, Missouri, where he always claimed to have relatives nobody ever met. Their mother told them that the people in town were immediately suspicious of a man with the strange last name and no connection to the famous author with whom he shared it. He’d gotten a job at Cranwell Station running the gas pumps and then as seasonal help with Rachael’s daddy on the farm. That was when seventeen-year-old Rachael met twenty-year-old Matthew, and, according to Rachael, fell madly in love. Nobody was happy about it, especially Rachael’s mother, Maryann James. But then Aunt Beatrice sent a letter to Maryann, and everything changed. Rachael told the story often, and even though she never really knew what was in that letter, as her mother burned it in the fireplace soon after receiving it, Rachael told her daughters that she was forever in her aunt’s debt, because she knew it was that letter that changed her mother’s mind. Aunt Beatrice might not use her voice, but that didn’t mean her opinions weren’t always heard, loud and clear.

  Pfeiffer knew after her father’s death that her mother wanted to leave Cold River, but she hadn’t wanted to uproot her children, especially Mary. Mary had been so much like their father. She was dark and quiet, and she had a way about her that made people fall in love with her, despite the fact that she was so different. It was the same trait that eventually allowed the town of Cold River to fall in love with their father and treat him as one of their own. Pfeiffer figured that it would have been difficult for their mother to pack up four children and leave the safety of the town she’d known her whole life, and she didn’t blame her for it. In fact, she was grateful.

  Even after their father’s death, the Hemingway sisters lived a happy and comfortable life. Their mother was an artist when she wasn’t farming and baking goods to sell at the farmers market, and she devoted every second she had free to them.

  Still, everything changed when their father died. Their mother wasn’t as happy. She didn’t sing or dance around the house anymore. She didn’t smile as much, and money was always tight.

  One morning, Pfeiffer and Hadley overheard their mother talking on the phone to one of her friends. She was crying, her voice barely audible above the sobs. “I can’t do this anymore,” she was saying. “I can’t do this without him.”

  There was a pause, and then their mother said, “I can’t ask my aunt for any more money. It’s not right.”

  Another pause.

  “I don’t know what we’re going to do. She won’t help me if we don’t live here. That’s what she said in her last letter,” Rachael said. “She wants someone here to take care of this place, but we’re barely scraping by.”

  Pfeiffer felt something clench inside of her stomach. She felt sick, the way she felt when she’d eaten too much Halloween candy or that time Hadley dared her to swallow watermelon seeds. Beside her, Hadley sucked in air and clenched her hands together tightly.

  The girls crept back to their room in time to pretend to still be asleep when their mother came to wake them. They never spoke about that day again.

  “Well,” Martha said, draining the last of her Coke, “I think I’ll go on to bed.”

  Pfeiffer took a final swig from her glass, draining the contents. “Are you going up there to try to make nice with Hadley?”

  “No.”

  “Yes, you are,” Pfeiffer told her. “You know, I’m just as good as Hadley when it comes to sniffing out a liar.”

  “Again, it’s not a competition,” Martha replied. “Just promise me that you’ll at least try to be nicer to her tomorrow, okay?”

  Pfeiffer sighed. “Fine.”

  “Say it.”

  “I’ll try to be nicer to Hadley tomorrow.”

  “And if you’re not nice,” Martha continued, “I’ll blame any relapse I might have on you.”

  “I can just see the headlines now,” Pfeiffer replied. “‘Ugly Sister Forces Beautiful Sister into the Waiting Arms of Jim Beam.’”

  Martha laughed. “Stop it,” she said. “I just think we need to be nice to each other, that’s all. And the only way I’ve ever been able to get you to listen to me is to threaten you.”

  Pfeiffer knew her sister was right. She did need to try to be nice. She wanted to tell Martha exactly what she’d been going through these last months—the loss of her job, of her life . . . of everything. If anybody understood recent misery, it would be Martha. She poured herself another drink and said, “I’m glad you gave this stuff up, bu
t damn, I have to admit I like it.”

  “You like it enough to lose a husband over it?” Martha asked.

  “I don’t know,” Pfeiffer replied. “I don’t know much about husbands in general, but I can’t say I ever really liked that one of yours.”

  “He wasn’t all bad,” Martha said.

  “No?”

  “Don’t believe everything you read.”

  “I never do.”

  “Not even the things you publish?”

  Pfeiffer sucked in her breath and hoped her sister hadn’t noticed the second of hesitation she’d allowed to pass over her face before she said, “I deal in fiction, mostly.”

  Martha stood up and stretched. “Long day tomorrow, especially if I’m going to get back to Nashville before it gets too dark out.”

  “So you’re leaving tomorrow, then?” Pfeiffer asked. She hadn’t known what she expected, really. Of course Martha would go home. So would Hadley. She was the only one who didn’t have a home to go back to.

  “That’s the plan,” Martha replied. “I need to get back in the studio, get back to work, if I ever want anyone to talk about anything other than my train wreck of a life.”

  Pfeiffer was thankful that her own train wreck of a life wasn’t as public as Martha’s. That was something, at least. “You could write new songs here,” she said.

  Martha laughed. “Can you sell books from here?”

  Pfeiffer shrugged. She honestly hadn’t thought about it. “I guess I could.”

  “I doubt your publisher would like that too much,” Martha replied. “Besides, there isn’t a damn thing here I want to write or sing about.”

  “It would be a nice hideout, in any case,” Pfeiffer said.

  “I don’t need to hide out,” Martha said. “I need to be back in the damn spotlight, in a fabulous dress looking like a skinny Missy Lion.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  “Are you sure you’ll be okay down here by yourself, Pi?”

  Pfeiffer wasn’t sure. But she didn’t want to say it. What she wanted to do was have several more glasses of whiskey and pass out on the couch. “I’ll be fine,” she said. “Leave the bottle.”

  Martha raised her eyebrow but obliged. “See you in the morning,” was all she said.

  For a moment, Pfeiffer thought about how it used to be with her sisters, about when they were close as children and teenagers. She thought about the way they’d all slept together the night of their mother’s and sister’s funeral, her bed and Hadley’s pushed together in the middle of the room to accommodate their bodies. They’d huddled there, thigh to thigh underneath the covers, awake but not speaking. They’d continued sleeping that way for weeks until their aunt found out and insisted that they sleep in their own rooms, forcing Martha into the room she’d once shared with Mary. Pfeiffer could hear Martha crying at night when she thought everyone else was asleep, but the girls were scared, and they didn’t want to do anything that might anger their aunt, worried that she’d find a way to split them up. Of course, Bea never would have attempted anything like that, but the damage was already done. Losing their father cracked the foundation, but losing their mother and sister caused it to crumble entirely.

  Aunt Beatrice, for her part, remained silent, as always. She didn’t force the girls to talk about their loss the way the social worker had. She was a quiet presence in the house, and Pfeiffer realized, looking back, that she was probably just as scared as they had been.

  Pfeiffer always thought that once she and her sisters left Cold River, their aunt would resume her life in St. Louis, but she didn’t, and it puzzled Pfeiffer. All those years she refused to come home, and now she refused to leave. She refused to sell the farm, staying all the way out there alone, with only Old Crow to keep her company. She didn’t drive and rarely went into town, and of course, she didn’t speak to anyone.

  Pfeiffer poured herself another drink and stood up to scan the room. Her aunt sure had let the house fall into disrepair. If she couldn’t get around to fixing things herself, why wouldn’t she just hire someone else besides Old Crow, who was older than she was? It didn’t make sense.

  Of course, their aunt had been incredibly private. She wouldn’t even write about her life before the age of seventeen. That was the year Aunt Bea left for St. Louis and began work in one of the factories there. She’d written to their mother that she liked the work because nobody expected her to talk. She’d shown them pictures of her time there, but for the most part, Aunt Bea’s room and all of her belongings were strictly off-limits. The sisters hadn’t liked that—being told there was an entire room in their own house where they could no longer go. The room was no longer a sanctuary, no longer a safe space, but a cold and shut-off part of their lives that they weren’t allowed to touch.

  Pfeiffer studied herself in the mirror hanging on the wall by the staircase. The room was dark and the image she saw was warped and grimy, but she could still see the outline of her face. She looked like her mother’s side of the family—like the James women who came before her. Her sisters favored their father; even now, with her bleached hair and plastic surgery, Martha still looked like Matthew Hemingway. Mary had looked like him, too—a smaller and darker version. At least, Pfeiffer thought Mary looked like their father. She couldn’t remember now; so many of those memories were as fuzzy as the mirror. Where her sisters were soft, Pfeiffer was hard. Where her sisters’ noses turned up, Pfeiffer’s was straight. Where her sisters were tall, with rounded hips and breasts, Pfeiffer was short and as angular as a line.

  It wasn’t that Pfeiffer hadn’t tried to be like her sisters. She had. All her life she’d tried. She’d tried to soften up, to be less sarcastic. She’d tried to smile and be polite. She’d watched her sisters and her mother with the same kind of curiosity one feels when visiting a museum. But no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t make it work. She couldn’t be like them. She felt staccato around them—a menace.

  Maybe she was too much like her aunt, and that was why she’d felt safe with her. Aunt Bea always seemed to know what Pfeiffer was thinking. She hadn’t tried to cajole Pfeiffer into compliance. She hadn’t scolded her for her sharp tongue. She’d just smiled and patted the seat next to her, allowing Pfeiffer to rest her head on her shoulder when nobody else was looking. Maybe Pfeiffer hadn’t gone home to visit like she should have. Maybe she should have fought her aunt to be there. Despite that, however, her aunt’s presence had been a comfort to her, even all the way in New York City. Now that she was gone, Pfeiffer felt more alone than she had in a long time, an orphan for always, because the people she loved always seemed to die before she got the chance to tell them good-bye.

  Turning away from the mirror, she downed the whiskey in one gulp and sat back down on the couch to pour another. It was going to be a long night.

  Chapter 7

  Pfeiffer

  IN THE DREAM, PFEIFFER WAS EIGHT YEARS OLD. SHE AND her sisters were at the creek below their house, searching for tadpoles and crawdads. Mary was four, already so dark-eyed and thoughtful. She rarely spoke unless she had to. In this dream, though, she was chatty, jubilant because Hadley was carrying her on her hip and pointing out the different kinds of birds in the trees.

  “Is Old Crow a bird?” Mary asked.

  Hadley laughed. “No, he’s just a man,” she replied.

  “An old, old man,” Mary said.

  “He’s not so old,” Hadley said, trying to keep her face stern after her fit of laughter. “And you should always be kind to him, okay?”

  Pfeiffer looked up from the stream, a crawdad dangling between her thumb and forefinger. “He turns into a bird at night,” she said.

  “He does not!” Hadley protested. “Don’t listen to her, Mary. She’s just trying to scare you.”

  “He does so,” Pfeiffer replied. “He turns into that old black crow on the tree branch outside your window. You’ve seen him, right?”

  Mary shook her head back and forth, eyes wide. “No!”

/>   “Well, he’s there,” Pfeiffer continued. “Watching you to make sure you’re being good. Because if you’re not, he’ll peck your eyes out!”

  “That’s enough!” Hadley started. “You’re scaring her!”

  Pfeiffer threw the crawdad at Hadley, causing her to drop Mary onto the ground. Mary pitched forward, landing on her knees. She started to cry, and when she sat up, there was blood trickling down one of her knees.

  “Ouch!” Mary groaned, covering her knee with her hands. “Ouuuccchhh.”

  Hadley turned to glare at Pfeiffer. “You’re awful,” she spat. She bent down and picked Mary up off the ground and cooed to her, “Shhh, it’s okay. Don’t worry. Let’s go home and get you cleaned up.”

  Pfeiffer stood there for a moment watching them go, ambling over to where her sisters had been standing to search for the crawdad. She found it, struggling in the grass, wriggling its back half from side to side in an effort to scurry back to the creek. She knew she could pick it up and take it back or let it find its way itself. Either way, it would be fine. Instead, she lifted up her foot and pressed down on the little creature, hard, until she heard the inevitable crunch.

  She waited to feel something, anything, about what she’d just done—but she didn’t. All she felt was numbness in her lips and fingertips that she couldn’t explain and a small, low buzz in the back of her brain. Everything else muted, turning a taupe color against the brilliant blue of the Ozarks skyline.

  Pfeiffer opened her eyes, expecting to see the high, white ceilings of her apartment in New York City. Instead, she was staring up at cobwebs and exposed beams. It was then that she realized that she was in her childhood home and that the buzzing in her head was the alarm on her phone, vibrating on the coffee table.

  She reached to turn off the alarm and swung her legs over the side of the couch. To her surprise, her feet didn’t hit the hardwood floor. Instead, they hit something warm. And furry. And lumpy. Pfeiffer pulled her feet back up and shoved them under the blanket, hanging her head down to see what she’d just touched.