Sisters

by Prue Leith

  Poppy had known and liked Ramon for years but she wanted to get home. She kissed his cheek and said, “I’d love to, but I’m pooped. Rain check?” She waved at the others as she made for the door, scrabbling in her handbag for her keys.

  Filumena was one of the most demanding parts she’d ever played, and they were due to reopen in a fortnight. She had hoped it would be easy, because the production and cast were to have been the same as before. But now they were rehearsing the understudy for Diana, the original having decamped for Hollywood. The understudy was going to be good, better than her predecessor. But it took so long.

  Thank God we get into the theater next week, she thought. She knew her performance lifted on a real stage. These dreary community halls and poxy rehearsal rooms depressed her.

  It was after 10 p.m. when she entered the central lobby of their Paddington building and felt the welcome blast of air conditioning. The lights of Eduardo’s offices were on, and she glanced through the clear glass panels that alternated with the frosted ones. A few architects still crouched over computers in the big open office beyond reception, and Richard was at the espresso machine in the bar area. She waved to him and he lifted his elbow in the Do-you-want-a-drink? sign. For a second she was tempted. It would be nice to wind down with a glass of wine like she used to in the old days. In those days Eduardo’s office was a cramped floor in Soho, and was more like a club than a work place. She’d turn up after rehearsals with her actor friends and they’d all have a few jars and then go out to eat.

  Maybe she’d go in, have a drink with Richard and see if Eduardo was ready for supper and home. But then she remembered Eduardo was in Spain. Or was it Manchester? She frowned. She should remember where her husband was. The thought flashed into her head that maybe she didn’t think about where he was because she didn’t want to think about who he was with. Did he buy Manchester condoms too?

  She shook her head, put her hands together under her tilted cheek, signaling sleep. Richard gave her a thumbs-up of understanding and Poppy waved again and stepped into the lift. She liked Richard. The little incident was pleasing. A whole conversation in age-old sign language.

  As she rode up the two floors, she wished that at least the children, or even her mother-in-law, were home. But it was school holidays, and Guillia and the children were in the country.

  She had a slight headache. Must be the heat. She swallowed a paracetamol, had a shower, and settled down in her pajamas to watch the 11 p.m. nightly news with a bowl of cornflakes on her lap and a glass of wine at her elbow. Being on one’s own had its compensations.

  When the telephone rang she thought it would be Eduardo, He usually rang late when she was working. But it was Carrie, ringing to see if she’d like to come to supper one night, or catch a movie. “I bet you aren’t eating proper food on your own.”

  “You must be psychic,” returned Poppy. “I’m eating cornflakes in front of the box. And how did you guess Eduardo was away?”

  “Oh I . . . I don’t know. You must have told me. Or maybe he said he was going to Manchester.”

  So, thought Poppy. It is Manchester. “He’ll be back at the weekend,” she said. “We’ll go to the country. Or rather he will, and I’ll follow on Saturday after the first dress rehearsal. Do you want to come?”

  “I’d love to. But what about this movie then? How’s tomorrow? If we don’t do it soon you’ll have opened and we’ll have no chance till the end of the run.”

  Poppy explained about the never-ending rehearsals. They agreed she’d go to Carrie’s whenever she got off, early or late, and they’d decide then on movies or dinner, or scrambled eggs and a video.

  In fact, Poppy arrived early, and the sisters carried tall glasses and big bottles of Pilsner Urquell into Carrie’s little garden, lying them down on the unmown lumpy grass.

  Carrie made a half-hearted attempt to wipe the London grime from a plastic chair, but Poppy waved her away and collapsed into it saying, “Don’t bother, Carrie. I’m absolutely filthy. You have no idea how dirty a community hall can be. And I’m sweaty as a racehorse. Probably stink too.”

  Carrie poured a glass and handed it to Poppy. Poppy looked at the pale beer and foamy head, then held the cool glass to her hot cheek.

  “Oh Carrie, I should not drink beer, but what the hell?” She swallowed a mouthful, eyes shut. “Heaven in a glass.”

  Carrie lay on the grass and stretched like a cat. Poppy noticed, as she always did, how lithe and beautiful Carrie was, even wearing chef’s checks and a threadbare tee shirt. Carrie looked up at the overhanging tangle of greenery and said, “You wouldn’t like to look after my garden as well as our mother’s, I don’t suppose?”

  “Dead right I wouldn’t.” Poppy turned her head to take in the overgrown borders and moss-covered paving. “Why isn’t it all dry as a bone? We’re in the middle of a heatwave. And I don’t see you out with a watering can every evening.”

  Carrie sat up with a gleeful snort. “Too right. But next door have this massive watering system which comes on every night at 2 a.m. and includes my little patch by mistake.” Carrie grinned at Poppy. “They’re mega rich, but they’re such mean bastards they’d go ape if they knew they were giving away water.”

  Poppy said, “But isn’t there a hosepipe ban on? I thought sprinklers weren’t allowed either?”

  Carrie laughed, “Oh my law-abiding big sister! Yes there is. If it wasn’t that I’m a beneficiary, I’d report them, just to see their toffee noses out of joint.”

  Poppy closed her eyes and let the Pilsner seep into her. Wonderful how alcohol could turn one kind of exhaustion into another: from fraught and miserable to pleasantly languorous. And Carrie’s nonchalance always cheered her.

  They talked about Poppy’s rehearsals, and then about Karl’s plans for Kaia Moya: he wanted to join a marketing consortium to sell bush holidays in the States. After a while they lapsed into silence, enjoying the cool of the shade and the lager.

  Carrie poured them both another glass. Shouldn’t, thought Poppy, its going to my head.

  “So,” said Carrie suddenly. “Are we going to the movies?”

  “Oh let’s not, Carrie,” said Poppy. “It is so divine here. I don’t think I could bear the effort, all those bodies in a queue, and hot furry seats, and maybe no air-conditioning . . .”

  “OK, OK, Popps. It’s not obligatory. We’ll stay in and get plastered. I’ve got Cat Ballou on video. Or Shakespeare in Love, which I’ve never seen.”

  “Cat Ballou,” decided Poppy. “I don’t want anything about actors and plays.”

  Poppy let the back of her hand caress the top of the uncut grass, swinging her arm gently. I must be drunk, she thought. It feels so good. She said, “Do you remember the bit when Lee Marvin is pissed as a newt and the Indian kid says ‘Your eyes are all bloodshot. They look awful’ or something, and he says . . .”

  “You should see them from my side!” Carrie and Poppy said the line together, already laughing.

  Once they started laughing, they couldn’t stop. And it launched them down a path of telling each other old chestnuts.

  Poppy said, “Do you remember your Standard Two science exam?”

  “Of course I do. Mum and Dad told everyone who came to dinner for years afterward. I used to die of embarrassment, but it’s funny now.”

  The sisters again quoted together, their faces alight with amusement, eyes on each other’s.

  “The abominable cavity contains the bowels, of which there are five—a, e, i, o and u.”

  Carrie, her eyes streaming, said, “And who put ‘To keep milk from going sour, keep it in the cow?’”

  Poppy, wiping her eyes with the back of her wrist, said, “or ‘For fainting, put the head between the knees of the nearest medical doctor.’ If Eduardo saw us now,” Poppy spluttered, “he’d think we were drunk.”

  “We are drunk,”
said Carrie. “Well, mildly drunk. Which you do not get often enough, Popps. Your life is too serious. Serious work. Serious family.”

  Poppy heaved herself out of the chair and said, “Carrie, darling, can I have a shower? I’m so filthy, and if we watch a video I’ll be too tired to have a bath when I get home.”

  Carrie gathered up the glasses and empty bottles and said, “Sure, Popps, you know where everything is. Grab a clean towel from the landing cupboard. I’ll make cheese on toast or something.”

  Poppy dumped her bag and kicked off her shoes at the bottom of the stairs. As she walked up to Carrie’s bathroom she peeled off her clammy shirt, and started to undo the buttons of her jeans.

  She helped herself to a towel, and dropped it on the cane chair in the bathroom. She pulled off the rest of her clothes, tossing them into a pile in the corner. She would borrow something cool and baggy from Carrie. She turned on the shower, and was about to step into it when she realized there was no soap or shower gel.

  She looked across at the bath, but there was only an empty mini-bottle of some hotel shampoo. Damn, I really want some nice smelly soapy bubbles, she thought. She opened the little mirrored cabinet above the basin with a jerk, and several flat boxes of medicines fell out of it, cascading into the basin.

  Blast, she thought. Why can’t they be proper bottles like they used to be? She started to gather the packages up: sore throat lozenges, anti-histamines, Rennie’s. And then her hand stopped. As if touching the next package would burn it.

  Suddenly she was completely sober. Horribly sober. She stood immobile, her brain whirring, her eyes fixed on the packet still lying in the basin. She wanted to stop thinking. This train of thought was taking her somewhere she did not want to go. But she couldn’t stop. Click, click, click. A plus B equals C.

  It was a condom pack. The condoms were Spanish. VIVA L’AMOR. She had seen them before. She’d found them in Eduardo’s washbag. They were not available in England.

  Poppy picked up the pack. Click click click. No English lettering. Only Spanish. Carrie did not go to Spain.

  Her husband was sleeping with Carrie.

  That’s why she knew he was in Manchester.

  She walked out of the bathroom, still holding the condoms, and sat on the bed. She must think. Must decide what to do. But her brain, so inexorable before, was now stuck in a groove.

  Her husband was sleeping with Carrie. He was in love with her sister. Her best friend. The woman she had just spent an hour laughing with. The two people she loved most in the world were sleeping together. Deceiving her. Betraying her.

  She stood up. What was she to do? Then sat down again.

  Carrie was at the door, a glass of red wine in each hand. “Did you find the towel?” She held out the glass, but Poppy did not take it. Poppy seemed to look past her, her round face pale, distraught.

  Carrie said at once, “God, Popps, what’s the matter?” She put the wineglasses down on the bedside table and said, “What’s happened? Are you all right? Why are you sitting here with no clothes on?”

  Poppy took her glasses off, and put them back on again. Her eyes for the first time met Carrie’s and they were hard as nails.

  “You’re sleeping with Eduardo,” she said. “You’re having an affair with my husband.”

  Carrie’s mouth opened, there was a tiny pause and then she shouted, “What? What? You’re mad.”

  Poppy held up the condom packet. Carrie took it, and said, too quickly, “So what does that mean? I agree I sleep with guys from time to time. But Poppy, what’s got into you? How can you think I’d sleep with Eduardo?” Carrie’s earnest eyes were wide and pleading, concerned and hurt.

  For a second Poppy was tempted to believe her. It would be so nice to believe her. But she knew Carrie was lying. She’d heard her plead her innocence throughout their childhood. She stood up, and tossed the condom packet on the bed.

  Her voice was stone. “Then how come your condoms come from the same chemist in Bilbao as Eduardo’s? The ones you told me not to worry about, because all men were weak and unfaithful, and it didn’t mean anything serious? Well, I hope you are right about that. I guess we are both about to find out.”

  Suddenly her being naked in front of her sister was unbearable. She stood up and walked swiftly into the bathroom, shutting the door, and sliding the bolt, as if she thought Carrie might insist on following her.

  Poppy rooted in the pile of clothes for her knickers and bra. They were damp from sweat, and she struggled to get them on. All the time she was dressing, she avoided looking at herself in the big mirror. She mustn’t let her mind dwell on Carrie naked in front of that mirror, of Eduardo peeling off his shirt. Right now she had to just get away. Get away from Carrie. Get out of her house. Go. Go.

  When she came out of the bathroom Carrie had left the bedroom. Poppy was relieved by this, even though her mind told her that if Carrie was innocent she’d have banged the bathroom door down. But then she already knew Carrie wasn’t innocent.

  As Poppy walked steadily down the stairs, a part of her brain congratulated herself on a perfect exit, even without her shoes. I’m doing what I do best, thought Poppy. I’m acting. She held the banister rail, treading carefully. At the bottom of the stairs, she was conscious of Carrie in the kitchen. She did not look at her. No point in adding to the melodrama. She put on her shoes, picked up her bag and walked out into the street.

  *

  Carrie’s first instincts were to barge into the bathroom after her sister, stop her, tell her it wasn’t true. Put her arms round her and comfort her, make the pain go away. But something in the straightness of Poppy’s plump bare shoulders, in the carriage of her head, prevented her. Besides, Carrie was frightened. She did not know what to do.

  She went downstairs, saying to herself she needed time to think. She’d stop Poppy before she could leave. But when Poppy came down and calmly donned her shoes, picked up her bag, went out, and turned to close the door quietly behind her, Carrie found she could not move.

  Carrie clutched her hair each side of her temples, pulling hard. Then she ran into the study and got her Filofax from her bag. On the inside cover was a yellow sticker with Eduardo’s Manchester hotel number.

  Her hands were shaking so much she had to have three goes at it, but at last she heard a brisk “Good Evening. Hotel Manchester.” She gave Eduardo’s room number, her throat tight and heart banging, her eyes staring wide but unseeing at the dresser shelves, laden with cookbooks.

  He wasn’t there. She knew it as soon as the long buzz had sounded three times. But she remained frozen, listening to the sound of distant ringing in an empty room, until there was a click and a recorded voice told her her party was unable to take the call but she could press One to leave a message, or Two to return to the operator, Three to . . . She pressed One. More clicks, and then a different recorded voice: “This is the Guest Messaging Service. Please record your message now.” Beep.

  When she finally got to speak her, voice had vanished. What came out was a small squeak, and then a gasping “Eduardo. Poppy knows. Shit.” She swallowed and tried again, her voice stronger, almost angry. “Christ, Eduardo, where the hell are you? I need you, for Christ’s sake.” She tried his mobile then, but it was switched off. She left a calmer message on that, and put the telephone down.

  Carrie longed for comfort. For Eduardo to burst through the door and put his arms round her. For Poppy to ring her and say . . . say what? That she believed Carrie: of course she hadn’t stolen her husband. Or that she was glad really: it was OK. Eduardo and her had been strangers for years . . .

  But Carrie knew none of this would happen. Eduardo was out. And miles away. And Poppy’s eyes had been full of hatred.

  When she thought back to that look of Poppy’s it was like an action replay. She saw more clearly than the first time Poppy’s eyes, dry and slightly narrowed behind her spec
s. How could that one look have carried so much? Accusation, disbelief, scorn. Contempt for a sister who could so betray love, and who then denied it. Even loathing.

  The thought shook her. Poppy hates me. She actually hates me. But Poppy couldn’t hate her. Poppy had always loved her. Had defended her to their parents, stood up for her to Eduardo, helped her out of a thousand scrapes. Loved her and comforted her every time she’d been shipwrecked by some man. Believed in her and encouraged her. Been there for her.

  As she said the trite phrase to herself, been there for her, she realized just what she was losing. She was losing her mainstay, her best friend, her sister. Her mind kept turning, from long habit, to the thought that Poppy would know what to do. More than anything she wanted to do what she’d always done in a crisis, and pour her heart out to Poppy, who would give her wise advice and make her feel better.

  But now she couldn’t. She lay curled up on the kitchen sofa, every now and again writhing from one position to another.

  “Fuck it. I need a drink,” she said aloud, and fetched the bottle she’d opened for Poppy all those years ago. She looked at her watch. It was less than an hour ago. She poured a large glass at the sink, and drank it like medicine, in one go. She tipped the rest of the bottle into the glass and carried it through to the living room.

  Automatically she aimed the remote control at the television and a football match sprang to life. She crouched in an armchair, her feet under her bum, and watched the little figures running about the screen. Like Subbuteo, she thought. Or play-people.

  She didn’t follow the game. She had no idea who was playing whom. But she didn’t switch channels. She stayed in a ball in front of the screen, her eyes glued but unseeing. She drank steadily, and when the glass was empty, she fetched a fresh bottle, and went back to the television. It was a game show now. She did not follow it, but she watched the screen as before.

  By nine o’clock she’d finished the second bottle. But she felt entirely sober. She’d hoped the booze would ease the anguish, but if anything, it was worse.