Gone Viking

by Helen Russell

  The words become blurred at this point as the ink has blended with tears. Hers or mine, I can’t tell.

  I don’t feel ‘ill’. I feel great. But it means I’ll have to have an operation when we get back and then chemo for three to six months. They’ve said I can expect hair loss, mouth sores, loss of appetite (we’ll see …), nausea, bruising, serious tiredness, and the shits. Oh, and my periods will probably stop (like yours!)

  I had no idea she knew about that …

  Best-case scenario is that you never get this letter, it all goes OK, and I’m on hormone therapy in six months’ time. I’ll just have disappeared for a while. It might all be fine. Or I might be diagnosed with secondary cancer, which has spread to my bones, and when it’s in your bones, you’re basically buggered.

  I’ll try everything I can to make it go away – mastectomy, chemo, hormone therapy – but I’m drawing the line at veganism. Bollocks to that. Mum made herself miserable by the end and she didn’t make it, did she? So what hope have I got?

  I’ll be honest; I’m not feeling great about my chances, Al—

  This line sinks a hook into my heart. She hasn’t called me Al since we were kids, I realise with a lump in my throat.

  —and I’m scared. But scared’s OK, right? You just have to do more of the ‘coping’. You just have to keep going.

  From what I’ve seen in the films, a letter like this is where I’m supposed to pass on some wisdom from beyond the grave – so don’t laugh, because I’m giving it a go. First up: try to have a bit more fun. Leave Greg or don’t leave Greg, but get happier. Somehow. It kills me (no pun intended) to see you like this. I know you don’t want to live like I do – and that’s fine – but I’ve always had the feeling you’re not really living your way either. So maybe give ‘fun’ a go. You’re always telling me about how you should be cutting out carbs/getting promoted/decluttering/deep cleaning something or other. But sod that. You’re too hard on yourself – you always were. Live a little instead. None of us have any control over our future, really, but the one thing we can control is how we live now. I’ve learned that, just lately. And life’s pretty brilliant – I’d like more of it. But generally I’ve lived to the full and I’m happier about the things I have done than I am worried about the things I haven’t. I never wanted kids – I know you don’t believe me, but it’s true. And I’m happy.

  I’ve never been much good at planning in advance – and now I don’t want to tempt fate. So I’m trying to enjoy every ‘new’ thing I try. The other day I had sushi – and it was surprisingly good! I bet you’d like it.

  People spend their whole lives thinking about what they haven’t got, rather than how lucky they actually are. I have great friends, a nice life, I can get up every day and have a fried egg sandwich if I want (so could you). So I’m not doing too badly. I know what makes me feel good, and it’s not being able to squeeze into tiny-doll-sized-child-clothes (see: Charlotte’s Pants – the weird sequel to Charlotte’s Web?!). It’s walking the dogs and spending time with friends – and you, when you’re not being a mardy cow. It’s the small things that I might not be able to do for a while. Or ever again. Having a really small bottom or a really big house (why is it never the other way around? You’d save a fortune on furniture …) wouldn’t change that.

  Maybe it’s easier for me to say this because I’ve had a kick up the arse to get to this point. Shit happens – but that’s life. And I don’t intend to waste a minute of it feeling sad. Neither should you.

  I plan to haunt you daily so this isn’t ‘goodbye’ – just a ‘see-you-later’. But I wanted to say this now in case I’m crap at the whole bothering-you-from-beyond-the-grave thing (you can never tell how good ghosts are going to be at getting their message across, can you? Patrick Swayze: crystal clear after a bit of help from Whoopy Whoopeee Whoopi (?) Goldberg. But Scooby Doo ghosts with a white sheet over their head? Vague as hell …).

  I know you think I’ve always been a drama queen. ‘Overly emotional’. So I’m trying, really trying to do this on my own. To hold it in – keep a lid on it and look after myself. To cope. Like you do. I’m only writing this so that hopefully you’ll understand when/if it’s all over, how much you mean to me. And how I hope I measure up as the kind of sister you wanted, in the end.

  Love, always,

  Melissa x

  Shaking, now, I try to remember to breathe as I fling open the door, not caring who hears me, and bolt outside.

  How to tell her I was wrong? That I’ve been wrong for years? That a lifetime of ‘keeping a lid on it’ and bottling up my emotions has created an unhappy – if not certifiably crazy – woman? Who talks to sheep?

  I need to tell my sister that I want to be there for her. That I want to look after her. That I can’t lose her and never want her to have to go through a single moment of pain without my help – if she still wants it – ever again.

  I have to tell my sister that I’m sorry.

  Twelve

  Hair lifts from the back of my neck as I run, at furious speed – heart going like a strobe light. Must get that seen to … I think. My foot is also throbbing, but this doesn’t matter now. Dusk has come and gone and the darkness is settling in as I hear a fluttering, blundering sound. Something flaps, close to my head. A bat? An owl? Bloody nature … I curse, but keep going.

  I can just make out figures on the horizon and my chest leaps at the hope that Melissa will be there among them.

  I’ll get her on her own, then I’ll apologise. I recite my plan over and over to match the rhythm of my run. But as I get closer, I see that none of the forms are Melissa-shaped. Instead, Inge and Margot round the hill, taking the scenic route home, with a blonde, Tricia-sized figure a little behind.

  Melissa isn’t there.

  I hope she’s all right, I think, torturing myself with the recollection of all the times I’ve let her down. The time she clung to my arms until they were sticky with sweat and tears because she didn’t want me to move out, until in the end, I had to peel her off. The family Christmases after Mum died that I weaselled out of, preferring to spend the day with friends or boyfriends or – once – alone. Anything to avoid being home and facing what had happened. You never doubt your parents’ immortality as a child. But I had to grow up, quickly, once Mum was gone. Emotions, I decided, were dangerous. The only feelings I ever had were feelings of fear and sadness – a lot like nausea. So better not to feel anything at all. A peculiar sort of hardening happened inside me – a calcification – and that was that. I could never risk allowing myself to soften again, or let my defences down, because if I did, I might just drift away.

  I didn’t think of Melissa once, I recognise now, ashamed.

  There were times she’d call the hall phone at university and say she could really do with a chat. So I did what any normal, caring sister would do: I put her on speaker phone and got on with my coursework, cross-legged in the hallway, adding in the odd ‘U-huh’ or ‘Really?’ to pretend I was listening. Or left her to chat with whichever passer-by happened to pick up. Or just left her, saying ‘I have to go’. Explaining that I was in a rush. Which I always was, somehow.

  In recent years, I’ve found excuses to avoid visiting her on the ‘Animal Farm’ in the Midlands. I’ve often referred to is as this, too – as though it were somewhere spectacularly alien – a remote island that I’d have to have inconvenient, unpleasant immunisations for several months in advance.

  I’m a terrible human being, I tell myself, again, as it starts to rain. Again. What is it with this country?!

  Melissa has barely spent any time with the kids, I realise now. It’s a miracle they’re so at ease around her and fond of her, based on the scarcity of visits. My fault, again – I never invite her over. And they never visit her. Because I never visit her. I hardly make the effort remotely, either. Even on Melissa’s birthday, the expensive gifts I’ve occasionally lavished on her – out of guilt, more than anything – have been things that I thought she
should have. Never things she’s actually wanted. How could I know what she wanted? I never asked.

  I cast my mind back and realise I can’t remember a single time I’ve failed in my apparent life’s mission to be ungenerous towards my sister. That, or judgemental. Or just absent.

  In many respects, my sister and I are strangers.

  That’s not what I want, I limp forward, blinking through a combination of rain and tears. I want to spend more time together. I want to get to know her, properly – as an adult – just like she said in her letter. I want to have time for sisterly habits – like siblings in story books have. I want to be able to say things like, ‘Oh, that? That’s just typical of my sister!’ Or ‘my sister always likes to … [insert preferred activity or mannerism as appropriate]’ – followed by peals of easy laughter. I want us to have traditions together and experience that scrum of emotional safety that Charlotte and Thomas already have. Because if they ended up the way Melissa and I are, right now … I’d be really, really sad about it.

  Water tips down from nowhere, with no clouds visible in the now inky sky.

  ‘Bloody Scandinavian, bloody changeable, bloody crap weather,’ I curse.

  The wind also appears to be picking up, plastering my hair across my cheeks as I run to the dock. I’m presuming she’s still here. Hoping, at least. Otherwise, I wince as the pain in my foot redoubles. It’s going to be a long circuit of all the other outbuildings and the rest of the island. Mercifully, my hunch is rewarded.

  I lurch to a stop just before the bulrushes give way to sand by the coast. A short figure, barely visible by a sliver of moonlight, is trying to push the boat towards a swiftly retreating tide.

  I watch her for a few moments as the earth bubbles over with wet, making miniature ponds between my toes. I say nothing, but Melissa seems to sense me there and stops what she’s doing to look up.

  ‘Alice?’ she calls out. ‘Is that you?’ My blinking, frightened face must register, because she repeats my name. ‘Alice?’ Sorrow locks up my throat and I find I can’t speak. It’s not that I don’t want to, like usual. I just … can’t. ‘If you’re looking for Tricia to apologise again, you’ve missed her—’

  ‘No, it was you I wanted—’

  ‘Me?’ She points at herself. ‘Lucky me. Are you going to try and “fix” me? Because I’m a bit busy right now.’ She gestures theatrically to the length of the boat. ‘Stuff to do, places to be, no time for a lecture—’

  ‘I didn’t come here to lecture you,’ I approach tentatively. ‘It wasn’t that. I … I …’ I speak all on the inhale, tripping over myself to get the words out. ‘I read your letter; I know you’re ill. I’m sorry. So sorry. And I want to help—’

  She sets down the oar that was in her hand and turns to face me, square on. ‘What? That letter was private!’

  ‘It was addressed to me …’

  ‘For six months’ time!’ Melissa looks angry.

  ‘Well, yes, but—’

  ‘What is your problem?’ Melissa asks again, shaking her head now. ‘Snoopy Mc-Snoop-face …’

  ‘Oh right, as well as “Judgey Mc-Judge-face”?’ This slips out. I can’t help it.

  ‘Yes!’

  ‘I can’t believe you didn’t tell me,’ I say, quietly.

  ‘I don’t want to talk about it,’ she snaps.

  ‘You’ve got cancer—’

  ‘Yes, thank you, Dr Quinn Medicine Woman. I said, “I don’t want to talk about it”!’ Melissa looks upset.

  ‘But the letter—’

  ‘You weren’t supposed to read that yet,’ she’s yelling now.

  ‘Well, I’m glad I did!’ I shout back, then mollify my tone. ‘Look, I came to say I’m sorry, OK? For everything. I’ll keep saying it every day for as long as I have to—’

  Melissa waves a hand at this. ‘It’s too late. What I said in the letter, just forget it.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I wanted to spend time with you during this trip but you know what? You’re bloody hard work. All you’ve done is moan! You’re always making out that you’re the only one who’s got it all sorted, you spend most of your time sneering at the rest of us – don’t pretend you don’t, I see those eye rolls – and you have a real knack for upsetting people—’

  ‘That’s not fair—’ I start, before remembering my catalogue of complaints and Tricia’s tears from last night. I haven’t exactly embraced Margot with open arms, either.

  Oh …

  ‘But I’m your sister …’ is all I can think of to say.

  ‘Well, you’ve been relieved of your duties,’ is her response.

  This hurts. But I won’t leave. I’m not going away.

  Nevertheless she persisted …

  ‘I know I can’t mend this with one big rain-soaked apology. I know it’ll take time and lots of little conversations and thought and effort. But I’m going to try,’ I tell her.

  She wears a fixed expression, lips pressed tight.

  ‘Just go. OK?’ she tells me, finally.

  ‘N-no …’ the word comes out shakily.

  ‘What?’ Melissa looks surprised. I move towards her, pedalling now, furiously, to gain traction – purchase – on anything that will get my sister to let me in. ‘What did you say?’ She stares, eyes narrowing.

  ‘I’ve been a shitty sister, I know it – but believe me, I don’t think that “my way” is best. I don’t think I’ve got any of it sorted.’

  If only she knew! If only I’d told her … Or let her see the girl who’s spent years repeatedly sticking her hands under the drier in the loos at work or at social events to drown out the sound of crying …

  ‘I feel completely inadequate—’

  ‘Do you?’ She sounds suspicious.

  ‘Most of the time! But you … you’re amazing.’ I mean it. ‘You get on with everyone. You can talk to anyone. Whereas I—’ I tug at my now straggly rat’s-tail hair in an effort to drag out the right thing to say before lighting on ‘—I can’t even go to the hairdresser’s—’

  ‘I thought it was a bit long, for an almost forty-year-old …’

  ‘Yes, thank you …’ I deserved that. And she’s right. Because aside from the snip of scissors, I find the total silence once we’ve covered all the usual bases – hair, weekend plans, where I’m going on holiday – utterly unbearable. As soon as I’ve used up my quotas of ‘mmms’ and ‘really?’s, I’m screwed until the nice no-talking bit with the hairdryer. ‘But you can set anyone at ease,’ I tell Melissa. ‘I’ve always admired that … and … and loads of things … and I’d love for us to be closer.’ She looks doubtful. ‘I mean it! I want to be there for you!’ I feel a wrench just looking at her but can’t break eye contact.

  Finally, she looks away and wipes her hands on her trousers in a futile attempt to dry them. ‘Please stop talking to me.’ She sounds tired, almost sighing out her words, before turning her attention back to the boat.

  ‘No.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I won’t stop talking to you,’ I say to her, ‘ever.’

  I’ve given up on a lot of things in my life so far – things that have been too painful or felt too hard. I’ve spent years in perpetual motion: always moving, always changing to strive towards the next goal in an attempt to busy myself and dodge anything scary. Well, not this time.

  ‘I’ll wait,’ I tell her. ‘As long as it takes.’

  Unsure as to how best to play this, I hobble over and lay my hands on the cold, wet wood of our Viking not-very-longship. Melissa tries to ignore me and shift the thing on her own, but it isn’t budging in the wet sand. Plus, I realise I’m holding on to the thing very, very tightly.

  Melissa gives it a shove in frustration, then says, ‘Well, you can wait all you like. I’m going.’

  Shit. Your move, Alice …

  ‘OK then, I’m coming with you,’ I say.

  She makes a non-committal grunting noise to show she’s heard me then gives the boat an almighty shunt
as I oscillate with anxiety.

  ‘I mean, I’m pretty sure a storm is brewing,’ I try, looking up, doubtfully. ‘And it’s very dark … you’re sure we should go out right now?’

  ‘Oh, I’m going,’ she tells me, wresting the vessel free from my grasp with a renewed surge of strength. ‘Now.’ She pushes it, sloughing through sodden sand towards the crashing sea.

  ‘Should you even be doing that in your condition?’ As soon as I’ve said it, I’m aware that it’s unlikely to go down well.

  Melissa looks as though she’s going to thump me.

  ‘I’ve been cleared for “strenuous exercise” before treatment starts by my actual doctor, thanks very much. I don’t need medical advice from a dentist.’

  Touché.

  I try another approach and point to the black wilderness of water. ‘But just look, it’s not safe!’ It isn’t that I’m scared, you understand (though, also: that) – I just have no intention of losing my sister now that I’m on the very cusp of finding her. It’s a total shitblizzard out there … ‘Why don’t we postpone until daylight? Or the weather’s better? Tomorrow, maybe?’

  But Melissa isn’t listening. A purple haze has descended – otherwise known as The Ray Family Stubborn Streak. She’s already wading in the shallows, then making a move to mount the boat, as only a squat five foot two woman in adverse conditions can try, and fail, to do. Three times.

  ‘I can do this,’ she mutters to herself, trying various manoeuvres. Our clothes are sopping wet and I’m becoming convinced that this would officially be classed as A Terrible Idea by any impartial observers. But really, what choice is there? I have to go with her, I tell myself – a statement of fact – I can’t desert her now.

  I’m just hoping that two floundering Ray sisters might be better than one.

  Here goes nothing, I think, as the wind lashes my face. I fling a leg over the side, with as much dignity as a woman in wet yoga pants can possibly muster, and take up an oar, determined to play my part. ‘OK, I tell her, I’m in. Here, give me your hand, I’ll help you up. Then we can go—’