I fell into a fitful, restless sleep, and I only woke up when we were about to land. I saw from the window that while I slept, England had turned into Scotland’s soft hills and moors at last, a million shades of brown and purple shining in the light of dawn.
My head and my eyes hurt as I waited at the station for the first train to Glen Avich, drinking a double espresso that managed to wake me up and bore a hole in my empty stomach. I couldn’t phone Logan to come and get me – it was nearly two hours round trip from Glen Avich to Aberdeen, and I didn’t want him to be away from Emily for so long. Finally I boarded the train, a tiny two-carriage. It was just a couple of pensioners, the conductor and me. From the train window I could see the landscape I’ve known forever, the place I’d called home for the first twenty-odd years of my life.
As I stepped onto the platform in Glen Avich, my heart soared for a moment, in spite of the exhaustion and worry. I took a deep breath, inhaling the sweet smells of pine trees and peat fires. I could see a cluster of pink clouds over the hills where the earth was kissing the sky, the air was chilly and pure, and there was a sense of peace, of calm all around. I was home. Funny that I should still call our Glen Avich house home, even after a few years of living away . . .
I nearly ran from the station to our house, a few hundred yards away, keeping my head down in the hope of not having to stop and chat with anyone. I just wasn’t ready to talk about Emily. My feet were heavy as I walked through the back alleys, avoiding the faster route through Main Street. I stopped across the road from our house, a whitewashed cottage that stood at the foot of St Colman Way. I took a deep breath, clutching my overnight bag. The lights were on in the windows upstairs, in the cold, grey gloom of early morning.
I crossed the road, each step agony. I didn’t know what I would find; I didn’t know what I would see once I stepped into Emily’s room.
I stood in front of the heavy wooden door and knocked lightly, my hands shaking. A woman I didn’t know, in a nurse’s uniform, let me in.
“You must be Inary,” she said.
I nodded, too anxious to speak, and I stepped in.
My brother was standing on the landing, conferring with Aunt Mhairi in a low voice, their heads bent towards each other, with Logan towering over her. My heart broke, because as soon as I saw my brother’s face I knew all was lost. I knew for sure that the doctors weren’t wrong like I’d always thought they would be. I knew for sure that Emily’s days were really coming to an end.
Despair is a weird thing, the way it can come over you in a scarlet wave, making you scream and sob and curse the world; or it can just freeze you on the spot, deprive you of all the energy and purpose, tear your soul away from you and leave an empty shell behind. That is how I felt when I saw my brother’s stricken face and I realised death was in our house, waiting for the right time, and that time would come soon.
“Oh, Inary! Thank goodness you’re here!” Aunt Mhairi smiled at me, her face lined and exhausted. She hurried down the stairs and enveloped me in a warm hug. Logan followed her, but he didn’t throw his arms around me, like I hoped. He stood in front of me and fixed his eyes on mine, as if he were pleading, as if he were drowning and only I could save him – but how could I save him when I was drowning too?
“You’re here,” he said, as if he were surprised. There was an accusation in his voice, and guilt clawed at me once more.
“Emily . . .” I whispered.
“She’s sleeping. Best not disturb her now.”
For a moment the air hung heavy between us, full of all the words we weren’t saying. Then Aunt Mhairi said she would put the kettle on and make some breakfast, and to come and warm myself by the fire, and those simple, everyday words about tea and toast and what a cold morning it was, and how lovely it was for all three of us to be back home together, broke the spell I was under and forced me back to the land of the living.
Emily was dying upstairs, and still, time would not stop, and we would keep going. But nothing, nothing would ever be the same again.
*
While Aunt Mhairi was making breakfast, I stepped into Emily’s room as quietly as I could and sat by her bed. She was ashen, and her lips had a blue tinge. There were dozens of medicine bottles carefully lined on her bedside table, and her sewing machine sat unused on its table in the corner, together with samples of fabric piled on top of one another. She’d been working on something, I noticed, before she was forced to stop; it was still under the needle in the sewing machine. Something in a deep plum colour, with tiny flowers all over . . .
My eyes returned to Emily, and I froze. That broken doll couldn’t be my sister. My sister was full of life and shining from the inside, happy and rebellious and strong. I noticed that her nails were painted bright green; it was such an Emily touch . . .
I was grateful that she was sleeping, because I had to step out and escape to my room. I screamed silent screams into my pillow, with Logan hovering on the doorstep, heartbroken and awkward. And then I dried my tears, I shaped my mouth into a smile, and I decided I would not cry again until . . . Until it was time. I decided I would be strong and never, never show upset in front of Emily. I decided I would bring her joy until her last moment. In a way, my parents’ death being so sudden was a blessing – I know it sounds strange, but at least they didn’t have time to be afraid, to suffer. But for Emily, it was going to be a long agony, a tunnel with only more darkness at the end of it.
I went back into her room, and she was waking, her eyelids fluttering, like she was still wandering in a dream. I took her in my arms – she’d lost weight, she was like a little bird – and instead of breathing in her lovely, sweet Emily scent, I breathed in illness and medication, and my heart sank once more. But I kept my resolution.
“Hey, sweetheart . . .”
“You’re back . . .” she murmured.
“Of course. I’m here to drive Logan mad.”
“You always do that,” she said, and laughed a small ghost of a laugh.
“She does that all right,” said Logan from the door. He looked at me, and there was a weird mixture of bitterness and relief in his eyes.
Yes, I was back, and I would not go anywhere.
4
The other half of me
Logan
So the prodigal daughter has returned. For longer than a weekend, it seems.
Emily had a good day – seeing Inary cheered her up. Inary is good at cheering people up, always has been. But she’s also good at running away when things get tough and leaving people in the shit.
That’s what she did to me.
Everybody is asleep now, and the bottle in front of me is nearly gone. This is worrying. I can’t remember starting it. But it seems the only way to get through the night. Once the whisky has done its job, I’ll be able to close my eyes and stop aching inside. Sleep and forget, for a few hours.
It hasn’t worked yet, but it will. Islay whiskies, you can trust them to take the edge off. Thing is, Emily’s picture from her college graduation is sitting on the mantelpiece across from me, and that makes it all the harder. She’s looking at me while I drink. I’m not crying, obviously. Not even a little. Maybe later, when I’m drunk enough.
When Emily was born I was ten years old. All I knew was that there was something wrong with the baby, that my mum had to stay in the hospital with her and she wouldn’t be back for a while. When Mum finally returned, bringing Emily with her, I didn’t even want to look at my sister. She’d turned our lives upside down and she’d taken my mum away for what seemed like an eternity. For days I refused to have anything to do with her.
One evening, though, I went into my parents’ room, alone. I hovered around Emily’s cot for a while, and then I couldn’t help wanting to catch a glimpse of her, this little creature who had something terribly, terribly wrong with her heart. She was tiny – had Inary and I ever been that tiny? I touched her cheek as gently as I could, and her downy hair. She was sleeping, but when I touched her sh
e opened her eyes, and I gasped – was she going to scream and cry? Had I upset her? Had I hurt her? I held my breath as I listened for my parents’ footsteps, waiting to be scolded . . . But Emily didn’t cry. She smiled, a tiny, gummy smile.
Knowing what I know now, I think she was too young to actually see me, and babies don’t really smile as early as that anyway. But at the time I was sure she did. I held her hand, and she clung on to me with her wee fingers.
Suddenly, I realised that someone was standing behind me – my mother.
“You’re her big brother. You need to look after her,” she said, and those words stayed with me forever. Emily was still clinging to my hand. She didn’t want to let me go. And I didn’t want to go.
Things pretty much stayed that way. My parents died in a car accident – I know, when bad luck was handed out, our family must have been first in the queue. I was twenty-three, Inary was nearly sixteen, and Emily thirteen. We kept going. Me, looking after my sisters; Emily, in and out of hospital; Inary, in a world of her own, with her stories and books and dreams of writing. We were a good team. Aunt Mhairi, our dad’s older sister, helped, and my parents left me enough to buy the Welly, the town outdoors shop, and it did good business. Enough to pay someone to work in it when Emily needed me. We muddled on.
Even when Inary went to study in Aberdeen, she was still there for Emily. And when she got together with Lewis – that pathetic excuse for a man – she was around at ours a lot, helping. I don’t know what I would have done without her, with my work, and the house, and the hospital appointments, and the constant worry and care and stress.
And then that bastard left her, and she was crushed. I’d never seen Inary like that, not even when our parents died – like a light had gone out of her. Or maybe everything had hit her all at once: our parents’ death, and Emily’s illness, and now this. Maybe it was the last straw. She moved to London, and I was left looking after Emily. Alone.
What can I say? I did it. What choice did I have? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a saint. Sometimes all that kept me from imploding was going out into the garden and chopping logs for hours at a time. There were days when I could have driven down to London just to shout at Inary for having landed me in it.
I should have done.
Yes, there were a few shit times. But I raise my glass to you, Emily. Because for all the days and nights I spent looking after you, with or without our parents, with or without our sister, I wouldn’t change a single one.
5
The long goodbye
Inary
And so the wait started. The doctors said a week; my sister’s heart beat for another three. The longest, hardest three weeks of my life.
Day followed night that followed day that followed night again, and we kept going, on autopilot, dazed and exhausted and hungry but too upset to eat or sleep. It was like life was draining away from us too. The nights were the worst. Emily slept for a few hours only, and the rest of the time we took turns keeping her company. There were two nurses who worked on shifts, as Emily had to be watched constantly, but we wanted to be with her too. I told her stories of my life in London, and read to her, and we watched late-night programmes together. When I finally hit my bed I was too tired to sleep and my face was sore from smiling.
Often Logan’s steps would linger in front of my door, the floorboards creaking, and I would know that he needed company. Things weren’t good between us, but still he looked for me, for some reason. I’d get up and we’d spend hours drinking tea – or in Logan’s case, whisky – in front of the living room fire, watching some mindless programme and exchanging a few words about everything and nothing. I did most of the chatting, in my endless attempts to keep everybody upbeat. I failed, of course. Logan carried the weight of the world on his shoulders. Sometimes he was so low he didn’t have the energy to speak; sometimes he was full of anger, against the genetic lottery that had misshapen Emily’s heart, against our parents for having died young. Against me, for having left. I could feel it, the resentment seeping out of him like vapour. I could feel his sorrow, and I was afraid for him nearly as much as I was afraid for Emily.
As for me, I sank into a silent, deep loch made of tears. Somewhere beneath its still waters I was floating, trying to come to terms with this new, strange, painful world. We’d been through the sudden death of our parents, and it had been worse than I could ever say . . . But somehow, as cruel as it was that they should go, it was still the order of things – grandparents go, then parents. Not your twenty-three-year-old sister, with her whole life ahead of her.
Lesley phoned every day. I clung to her voice like a lifeline, but every day I felt she was drifting further away, and my life in London was like a distant dream. I had stepped into a dark land alone, and as I travelled deeper and deeper into it not even my best friend could follow me.
*
“Read me something you’ve written, Inary.” Emily was lying curled up, her white hands under her cheek. I’d just given her a few spoonfuls of soup, and even that had exhausted her.
“Oh . . . Well, I’m working on this story . . . Cassandra. It’s about a werewolf, but it’s a bit rubbish.”
“I don’t believe you. You know I love your stories.”
“You won’t love this one . . .”
“Why don’t you write something about life here? In Glen Avich?”
“Funny you should say that. Lesley told me the other day that I had to look for my story to tell . . .”
“Maybe your story is here,” she whispered. I’d woven her hair in one braid on the side of her face, so it wouldn’t bother her as she lay. Her hair was so lovely, fair with a hint of red – she was the perfect strawberry blonde. I wondered if Alex had that particular shade logged into Chromatica . . .
I stroked her cheek, and she closed her eyes.
“Maybe,” I said. “Anyway, I’ll go and get my laptop. I bet it’ll send you to sleep . . .”
“Don’t be silly,” she murmured, smiling. I was about to step out when she called me back. “Inary?”
“Yes?”
“I was thinking of leaving my music to Lesley,” she said. My heart tightened. I didn’t trust myself to speak. I just stood there, all the air knocked out of my lungs. “Will you give it to her, when I’m gone? It’s all there . . .” She gazed towards her pea-green iPod on her bedside table.
“Don’t talk like this, Emily . . .”
“I might as well sort out my things . . .”
She was right. It killed me, but she was right. “Of course I won’t give it to her. I’ll sell it all on eBay and put it towards a jacuzzi for Logan.”
She laughed. It was my favourite thing, to make her laugh.
I sat on her bed, reading from Cassandra. After a while I could see her eyes struggling to stay open.
“Great, my book is sending you to sleep,” I said with a smile.
She smiled back, and then her eyelids fluttered, and she was asleep.
*
I tried to get out of the house once in a while, to get some fresh air and clear my thoughts. Glen Avich had welcomed me again, as if I had never left. Walking its streets didn’t feel like it did when I was only up for the weekend, or for short holidays. Back then I was always somewhere between Scotland and London, my head torn between two places. Now, there were no other thoughts but thoughts of Emily. Tomorrow didn’t exist, and I had no plans, no desires but making Emily as comfortable as she could be. Whenever my mind wandered to my life in London, to Alex, I tethered myself back.
I walked through Glen Avich like I belonged again, and in the here and now, I did. Every expedition out of the house involved stopping every few steps to chat with someone – everybody was friends or family. It wasn’t easy to live in a goldfish bowl, where everyone knew about me and everyone knew what we were going through, but sometimes it was a comfort. I never felt alone. The whole village was rooting for Emily, rooting for us.
I often went to Peggy’s shop for groceries – an
ything to tempt Emily’s dwindling appetite. Peggy is a distant cousin of mine – like most people in Glen Avich, I must admit – and her shop was one of the beating hearts of the village. It sold just about everything, from food to magazines to souvenirs, and even babies’ clothes, knitted locally and arranged in a little display on one side of the counter. From bleach to clothes pegs to coloured pencils, from buckets to homemade tablet to string – you’d find it there. Also, it was the place to catch up on everybody’s lives.
Peggy was a bit like a doctor and a priest and an agony aunt all rolled into one; everybody talked to her. If you were in need of a private consultation, she’d take you into the little kitchen in the back, give you tea or juice and sweets – depending on your age – and you could unload your heart. I remember sitting there many times, as my granny chatted with Peggy and her sister Flora – and I also remember asking myself, as we were all McCrimmon women (on my mother’s side), did they have the gift my granny and I had? I never had the nerve to ask. Now I couldn’t help wondering what Peggy would say about me and Alex if I confided in her . . .
I was there one morning, stocking up on reading materials for Emily – she loved fashion magazines, which we read snuggled up together in her bed – when my cousin Eilidh came in. I had heard she had moved back to Glen Avich and was living with Jamie McAnena, a blacksmith and artist and an old friend of my brother’s, but I hadn’t bumped into her yet.
“Inary! Oh, sweetheart,” she said, and held me tight. She smelled of green apples. “I’m so sorry . . .”
I never liked people feeling sorry for me, but on that occasion, somehow, it felt different. I hugged her and hid my face in her hair, and when we released each other I could feel my eyes welling up.
Take Me Home Page 4