The Sun Sister

by Lucinda Riley

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Oh, and did you call back that therapist Fi recommended?’

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘After Fi, she just doesn’t sound right.’

  ‘I understand, Electra, but you do have to find someone here in Manhattan. That’s the third one you’ve contacted who you’ve said is a no. Maybe you should just go and meet one of them? See how they are?’

  ‘Maybe, but I just don’t want to risk choosing the wrong person and them screwing up my head, you know? I’m in a good place right now, Mariam. And I have plenty of people to talk to if I need them.’

  ‘Okay. I don’t want to be a nag; it’s only because I care, Electra.’

  ‘I know, and you’ve been amazing, Mariam.’

  ‘Is there anything else you need before I go?’

  ‘No. You get home now and see your family.’

  ‘If you’re sure, because—’

  ‘I am. I’ve gotta learn to live without a babysitter sometime, don’t I?’

  ‘If you need me, day or night, just call. Promise?’

  ‘I promise. Please, Mariam, go home!’

  ‘I will. Thanks, Electra, bye.’

  ‘Bye.’

  The door closed behind Mariam, and for the first time in over five weeks, I was alone.

  ‘You’re going to go down to the gym and lift some weights, have some supper, then get into bed and watch a movie,’ I told myself, trying to stem the panic. So I went to the gym, had a shower, ate what Mariam had left me for my supper, then got into bed and switched on the TV. It seemed like there was only stuff on about gang warfare or shows set in hospitals, neither of which I felt were suitable for my first night alone. I did my best to concentrate on a rom-com, then a French movie, which normally I would have liked, but was so noir that I zoned out and started checking my emails on my laptop. I was thrilled to see that there was a long juicy one from Tiggy. It was also written in French, which made me glad that I had just watched forty minutes of the noir film as a warm-up.

  Chère Electra,

  How wonderful to get a letter from you (or, in fact, a letter from anyone these days), especially up here in the middle of nowhere. What with the internet signal being so unreliable, I do feel very cut off, which has both its pros and cons. But that’s like everything in life, isn’t it?

  Anyway, today is a good signal day, and so I am sitting outside at a picnic table, and looking across a valley (or ‘glen’, as it’s called here) that is turning a glorious purple with heather as we speak.

  The first thing I wanted to say to you is that I am your sister and even though it was sweet of you to apologise to me, it was totally unnecessary. I can’t think of one thing you’ve ever done or said to me that would warrant an apology – everyone calls me a ‘snowflake’, so that really isn’t a problem! – but it was just so lovely to hear from you.

  Ma told me a while ago that you’d decided to get help for your problems and honestly, Electra, I’m so proud of you. It’s incredibly difficult to ask for help, isn’t it? But making that leap is the important thing. I’m not sure if you’re out yet – I haven’t spoken to Ma or Maia in a while as I’ve been so busy – but wherever you are, I just want to send you the biggest hug and tell you that I’ve been thinking about you every day and praying for you in my own ‘Tiggy’ way. I know you’re not a great one for ‘woo-woo’, as you always used to call it, but all I can say is I feel that you’re massively protected, and will come out of what must have been such a difficult experience better and stronger and more beautiful than you ever were.

  As for me, I don’t think that I’ve ever been so happy! Maybe Ma told you that I’d had some health problems recently, and although I won’t be swimming the length of Lake Geneva anytime soon, as long as I take care of myself and don’t overdo it, I should live a long while yet.

  Isn’t it amazing how something good often seems to come from the bad? Well, out of my difficult health (and a shooting incident that sounds much more dramatic than it was, but I’ll tell you about that some other time), I have met The Love Of My Life. It’s a bit of a cliché, because he’s a doctor and he specialises in hearts, which is the part of me that’s had the problem. His name is Charlie Kinnaird and I’m ashamed to say that he is still a married man just now, with a wife who you would say was from hell! She’s certainly a very difficult character anyway, but the good news is they also have a daughter called Zara, who is from heaven! She’s seventeen and is currently at agricultural college, because one day she will take over forty-thousand acres of the most spectacular Scottish land you’ve ever seen (Charlie is actually a laird, which in Scotland means he’s a lord, but he never bothers with his title). He’s just moved hospitals so that he can be closer to me and Zara and to sort out the estate, which really does need a lot of time and even more money invested in it. Anyway, it’s all a bit of a mess at the moment, one way and another, but ironically, as I sit here gazing across the glen, I feel totally content, because I know that I have found the person that I want to spend the rest of my life with. And I’m lucky enough to be doing that in the most beautiful surroundings I could ever wish for.

  Also, I don’t know whether you ever opened your letter from Pa Salt? I opened mine and it sent me down a rabbit warren into my past. And, well, put it this way, if you think I’m a little ‘woo-woo’, you should meet Angelina, who is my seventy-year-old cousin! It turns out that I am descended from Romany gypsies in Andalusia, which goes a long way to explaining who I am and the weird things I’ve always seen and felt. When it’s all calmed down a little here, I intend to explore that side of me further, and I’m already working alongside the local vet, putting to use what Angelina has taught me about natural healing and treating animals. Eventually, I’ve decided that I’d like to help humans too with my gift, but for now, one step at a time.

  Anyway, darling sis, I do hope you haven’t forgotten our trip on the Titan to lay a wreath on the anniversary of Pa’s death; everyone else has said they can come, even CeCe, who you might have heard has moved to Australia. I feel instinctively that it’s terribly important we’re all there – above and beyond laying the wreath. Could you let me/Ma/Maia know that you can definitely make it? I can’t believe it’s happening this month!

  Well, that’s about all for now, though I’d love to hear more of your news, if you get the chance to drop me an letter. I’m going to send this off now before the signal disappears.

  All my love to you, Electra, and I can’t wait to see you at Atlantis.

  Tiggy xxx

  I smiled as I reread the letter just to make sure I hadn’t missed anything, and felt genuinely happy that Tiggy had found a life that so obviously suited her. Given I had the whole weekend to reply to her, I decided I’d save writing it until tomorrow morning, when my head would be clearer. I wasn’t good at chatty letters – or anything much writing-wise at the best of times – but her long letter deserved a decent response.

  Thinking of the approaching anniversary reminded me of the armillary sphere that had mysteriously arrived in the garden at Atlantis after Pa’s death. The bands had been engraved with our names and some numbers that Ally had said were coordinates to where we were all born, and there was also a quote in Greek for each of us. Ally had handed my details to me in an envelope, but for the life of me, I couldn’t remember where it was.

  Before I could think about it further, I decided to call Ally. Then, just as I realised it must be something like two a.m. in Europe, she picked up.

  ‘Electra? Are you all right?’

  ‘Hi, Ally. Yeah, I’m good, really good. I was just about to hang up when I remembered what time it is in Norway.’

  ‘Oh, don’t worry about that. Night and day have blurred into one recently. Bear’s now in full teething mode and even my legendary energy is being drained.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Ally. It must be hard bringing up a kid by yourself.’

  ‘Yeah, it is actually,’ Ally admitted. ‘An
d lonely, especially at this time of night.’

  Wow, I thought, raising an eyebrow that she couldn’t see. It was one of the few times I’d ever heard Ally admit to being anything less than superhuman.

  ‘Well, here I am, keeping you company, and sending you and Bear a big hug.’

  ‘And I’ve never been so grateful for it. Thanks, Electra. I’ve just been thinking that I might go home to Atlantis before the rest of you arrive. Maia called to say she’s going to arrive early, and I also need some Bear-support from Ma, aka “Grand-Mère”. I seriously can’t remember the last time I had more than a few hours’ sleep.’

  ‘That sounds like a great idea, Ally.’

  ‘Anyway’ – she cleared her throat – ‘are you just phoning for a chat?’

  ‘Partly. I got an letter from Tiggy, which reminded me that I wanted to ask if you still had my coordinates from the armillary sphere?’

  ‘Of course I do. Why?’

  ‘I guess I must have lost the envelope you gave me and . . . well, I had some time to think in rehab and . . .’

  ‘You’ve decided you want to know where you come from,’ Ally said very gently as a great squawk came from the other end of the line. ‘Hold on a minute,’ she said, as I heard some rustling and a kind of suckling noise. ‘Right, I’m just going to my laptop.’

  ‘Okay,’ I said, realising that my heart rate was increasing as I waited.

  ‘Soo . . . I’m opening the file now . . . Okay, here we go. Can you write these down?’

  ‘Yeah, sure.’

  Ally read out the coordinates, which I scribbled down. Then I stared at the set of numbers.

  ‘Thanks. So what do I do now?’

  ‘Okay, go onto Google Earth, and on the left-hand side there should be a little search box. Enter the numbers in there – they’re in degrees, minutes and seconds – then it should zoom in to the location the coordinates pinpoint.’

  ‘Great,’ I said. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Electra, are you actually going to look up the coordinates now?’

  ‘Yeah, why wouldn’t I?’

  ‘Only that . . . it’s a big moment, isn’t it, finding out where you’re from? Is anybody with you?’

  ‘No, but . . .’ Then a thought struck me. ‘Hey, Ally, do you actually know where I’m from?’

  ‘Well, when we were first shown the armillary sphere, I looked up all the coordinates briefly to make sure they worked, but honestly, I only have a general idea of where yours lead to.’

  ‘Okay, so you’re not worried about me looking at it because it’s bad or anything?’

  ‘Oh Electra, it’s not as simple as “bad” or “good” . . . I can tell you that my coordinates led me to a museum in Oslo. It now stands where an old theatre once was that my ancestor performed in. It turns out that my brother Thom and I were born in a hospital in a place called Trondheim in Norway. Sometime after that, I was privately adopted by Pa.’

  ‘Right. And none of us know why he actually chose us? He always said he had – chosen us especially, I mean.’

  ‘No, it could simply have been that we were in need of adoption and he wanted to provide a home for us. Are you worried about looking up where you were found, Electra?’

  ‘Yup,’ I nodded as I opened up my laptop, went to Google Earth on my browser and began to follow the instructions Ally had given me.

  ‘I suppose it’s a fair assumption that none of us were born into a happy family scenario,’ Ally said. ‘If we had been, we wouldn’t have ended up being adopted.’

  ‘True, true,’ I agreed as I tapped in the coordinates. ‘Okay, here goes . . .’

  ‘Want me to stay on the line or leave you to do this alone?’

  ‘Stay, if you don’t mind,’ I said, knowing this was not the moment to be brave. I watched the spinning wheel of death on my screen and sighed. ‘Sorry, for some reason the internet here is always slower at night . . . Right! Here we go . . . Okay, so we’ve got the globe and it’s closing in and it seems to be moving towards North America . . .’ I trailed off, feeling bizarrely like a NASA space reporter as the picture zoomed in on New York City, then onto Harlem. I watched with my heart in my throat as the pixels on the screen crystallised into a block of buildings on a leafy street, and a red pin landed on one.

  ‘Oh my God!’

  ‘What?! Don’t keep me in suspense here.’

  ‘Jeez!’

  ‘Electra! Please, has it shown you yet?’

  ‘Yup, it has,’ I nodded to myself. ‘It turns out I was born right here in New York City. To be precise, in a place called Hale House, which, according to Google Earth, is in Harlem and approximately –’ I counted quickly – ‘fifteen blocks or so from my own front door.’

  ‘You’re joking!’

  ‘I’m really not, no. Hold on, let me just google Hale House.’

  I read the few words that were on the screen and sighed heavily.

  ‘Quelle surprise! I was born – or at least found – in a mother and baby home for addicts and AIDS victims. Get me, hey?’ I said as I rolled my eyes.

  ‘Oh Electra, I’m sorry. Please don’t let this upset you. Maia came from an orphanage too, plus me from a hospital and . . . that’s how Pa found us, remember?’

  ‘I know, but . . . Anyway, it’s late, Ally, and you need to get some rest. I’m going to go now. Thanks so much for being there for me, and I promise I’ll be absolutely fine. Night.’

  I ended the call before she could stop me and stared at the Wikipedia page, then closed the laptop. It wasn’t so much the mother and baby part that I minded – Ally was right to expect most of us to have come from somewhere like that. It was the fact that I was pretty sure that my grandmother had mentioned to me that I came from a line of princesses. And somewhere in my head, this thought had stuck with me.

  ‘You seem to have got that wrong, Granny,’ I shrugged. ‘The only genes I inherited are addiction ones. Oh, and maybe a side of AIDS for good measure,’ I added morosely, knowing that I was being overdramatic, but feeling that I deserved a little self-pity right now. At least I’d been tested for HIV and knew I was clear, but that wasn’t the point, was it?

  Feeling distinctly unsettled, I decided to call the only sister who I knew was in a similar time zone to me and would also offer words of wisdom and comfort. Dialling Maia’s number, I waited for her to answer, but her voicletter picked up instead.

  ‘Oh, hi, Maia, it’s Electra. Don’t worry, I’m doing well and this isn’t a panic call or anything like that. I just wanted to see how you were and have a chat, you know? Oh, and also, do you have the translation you did of my quote from the armillary sphere? I’d like to know what it said. Okay, speak soon. Bye.’

  I stared at the phone for a while, hoping Maia would call back, but she didn’t.

  I picked up the remote again and started scrolling through the channels, trying not to dwell on what I’d just discovered, but felt panic rising up inside me as I pictured a vodka bottle, which could arrive within minutes if I simply lifted the concierge phone and asked the porter to go fetch it for me. It had become obvious to me that I was definitely more dependent on the booze than I was on the drugs – but one could so easily lead to another . . .

  ‘Shit!’ I said as I got out of bed, knowing I was in the danger zone and looking for something to distract me. I was in the kitchen, making a mug of ginger tea, when I heard my cell ringing from the bedroom.

  I’d just pounced on it when it rang off. It was Miles. I listened back to the message, which said simply, ‘Call me.’ In a panic that something might have happened to Vanessa, I did so immediately.

  ‘Hi,’ he answered after the first ring.

  ‘Is everything okay with Vanessa?’

  ‘As far as I know, yes. I’ve heard nothing more since this morning.’

  ‘Thank God,’ I said, breathlessly. ‘I . . . why did you call then?’

  ‘Because Mariam told me it was your first night by yourself.’

  ‘So you’re che
cking up on me?’

  ‘If you want to put it like that, then yeah, but I’m doing it because I know that the first night alone is always tough. I’ve been there, remember?’

  ‘Yeah, well, there are a heap of things I could have done tonight, but I decided to stay in,’ I replied, suddenly defensive.

  ‘And how is it?’

  ‘Oh, it’s . . . okay,’ I lied. ‘Not much on TV, mind you.’

  ‘You getting the feeling that the walls are closing in on you?’

  ‘A bit,’ I replied, which was the understatement of the century right now.

  ‘That’s normal, Electra. And I just wanted to say that I’m here – only a few blocks away as it happens – so if you need some conversation, all you gotta do is call, as the song goes.’

  ‘Yeah, thanks. That’s kind of you to think of me.’

  ‘One way and another, I’ve thought of little else,’ he chuckled. ‘It was quite a ride, these last weeks, wasn’t it?’

  ‘It was, yeah.’

  ‘The other thing I wanted to ask is if you were busy tomorrow?’

  ‘Er, no. Why?’

  ‘Because I’d like to take you uptown to Harlem and show you round the drop-in centre. It’s a Saturday and due to the lack of resources, we’ve had to close the doors over the weekends, but at least you can see the place itself.’

  ‘Wow,’ I said, struck by the coincidence.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Well . . . it’s something I just found out . . .’ I trailed off, not sure if I wanted to tell him or not.

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Like tonight. A few moments ago.’

  ‘And . . .?’

  Remember, you have to trust, Electra . . .

  ‘I just discovered that I was found by my adoptive dad in a place called Hale House. It’s in Harlem.’

  ‘I know it. Everyone in Harlem does. Jeez, Electra, that’s a big one! Who told you?’

  ‘My sister Ally. My Pa left coordinates for us all to look up if we wanted to know where he found us.’

  ‘Okay. You know what Hale House was in those days?’

  ‘Yup, a place where a woman called Mother Hale took in babies whose moms were addicts or had AIDS,’ I recited from what I’d read earlier.