Her Sister's Lie

by Debbie Howells

  I took a deep breath. “You should have something to eat,” I said, more calmly. “Why don’t you sit down?” As I turned my back to put a couple of slices of bread in the toaster, I heard him pull out one of the chairs. Wishing he’d say something, I tried to keep my patience. He wasn’t making this easy.

  It seemed pointless to ask more questions he’d refuse to answer. After placing a plate of buttered toast in front of him, I put the kettle on and made two mugs of tea. I handed one to him, then passed him a bowl of sugar. “Help yourself.”

  Again, he didn’t respond. He’d been through hell, I had to remind myself. But he wasn’t the only one . . . As I picked up my mug, I was thinking of Matt, here in this kitchen one evening not that long ago, before he left. We’d cooked a meal, and we’d been talking about Italy, one country on a whole wish list we’d planned to explore together. I remembered his hands in my hair, twisting it up on top of my head before letting it fall again, the touch of his lips on mine. Feelings I’d never known before, that I’d never feel again. Quickly I tried to push them from my mind, focusing instead on Abe, as he ate the toast and drank his tea.

  After he’d finished, I looked at him. “Would you like me to show you where your room is?”

  Without answering, he stood up and walked over to get his knapsack, then followed me through the door into the small den, which was one of my favorite parts of the house. It was cozy, its main feature a wood burner set in the old brick fireplace. I’d stacked logs on either side of it and pulled up a couple of armchairs close by. For the short time he was here, Matt and I had spent the long winter evenings in this room, drinking wine and putting the world to rights. I was struggling. It was impossible not to think of him. Matt was everywhere in this house, in every room, around every corner. Like now. I swallowed the lump in my throat.

  Two doors led off the den. “The sitting room’s through there.” I pointed to the one on the left. As well as a pair of sofas, it housed my piano and the three guitars that were all that remained of the much larger collection I’d had when we first moved here. These days, apart from when I was teaching, it was a room I rarely used. “There’s a TV in there—just make yourself at home.” I turned toward the other door, glancing at Abe. “The stairs are through here.”

  I led the way through to the staircase, then at the top, instead of turning left toward my bedroom, turned right, opening one of the three doors farther along the passageway. Switching the light on, I went over to the window and pulled the curtains closed, then fetched an extra blanket from the wardrobe. “I hope this is OK for you. The bathroom’s opposite. There are clean towels on the towel rail. Help yourself.” I unfolded the blanket and laid it on the bed, pausing for a moment. “I’m so sorry about your mum.” I watched him for a response of some kind, but apart from the slightest movement of his shoulders, there was nothing. Clearly, he didn’t want to talk. Maybe he needed to be alone. “Is there anything else you need?”

  He shook his head.

  “OK . . .” Stepping past him into the doorway, I hesitated again. “I’ll leave you to it . . . I hope you sleep well, Abe. I’ll see you in the morning.” Closing the door, I paused on the other side for a moment, listening for any sounds of movement, but there were none. Quietly I walked away.

  Downstairs in the kitchen, I cleared the mugs and plates away, then sat down. It was after midnight, but my mind refused to wind down. What was I going to do? My life had become unrecognizable. In a matter of hours, I’d discovered my sister had died and I’d become the guardian of her teenaged son. All just a week or so since Matt had walked out. Matt. Without Abe’s presence to distract me, the reality of his absence hit me anew, and now that I was alone, sadness overwhelmed me.

  After that meeting in the park, it hadn’t taken long for a closeness to develop between us. Matt and I had shared many common interests—he’d loved the same music I did, had the same sense of humor. His wife had constantly called, insisting on seeing him. She’d become obsessed, he’d told me, but I had no reason to worry. And I hadn’t. I’d trusted him. It made it harder to understand how after all his promises, after his declaration that I was the only woman in the world for him, he’d simply walked away without properly explaining why. Something had changed—almost overnight, it seemed. After he’d told me he was leaving, I’d tried to talk to him, but he’d been silent, closed off from me. Numb with shock, I’d waited downstairs while he packed a suitcase. The worst moment had come when he said good-bye. When this was his choice, I couldn’t make sense of the pain I’d seen in his eyes as they held mine briefly, before he looked away.

  I’d stood there, watching him close the door behind him, fighting an urge to run after him as he walked down the path, not moving, just listening until the sound of his car had faded away. He hadn’t told me where he was going, just that he’d come back sometime for the rest of his stuff. Ever since, I’d been waiting to catch him, wanting to talk to him, holding onto the hope that after a few days apart, he’d have changed his mind. But he hadn’t answered my calls or texts. I’d heard nothing.

  Now, sitting at my kitchen table, I was overwhelmed by a pain that was physical, leaving me gasping for breath. Then I slumped forward, my body shaking with sobs, as I gave in to grief. Not just grief for Matt, but for the life I’d believed lay ahead of us, for the future we’d planned to share, all of it gone.

  * * *

  The house was quiet the following morning. In the weak March sunlight filtering through the kitchen window, I sat at the table and made a few calls to cancel the pupils who had lessons booked over the next couple of days. There were too many matters needing my attention, all related to Nina and Abe. As I put my phone down, I thought briefly of Abe, upstairs in the small bedroom that was now his, with the window that looked across the fields.

  I’d found last night impossible. If I was honest, I was wishing I’d been more assertive—I was already dealing with enough. I should have told DI Collins straight out that this arrangement wasn’t going to work and that I hadn’t thought this through, but nor had I been prepared for the disruption, and the emotions Abe’s presence had unleashed.

  This morning, I felt the presence of Nina’s ghost around me, as long-forgotten memories flooded back. Guilt too, because I should have been able to help her, as she had me. I’ll always be here for you . . . Sisters help each other, Hannah. . . If only I had, Abe would still be living with her, instead of here, against his will, with me.

  Finding my bag, I hunted for the piece of paper DI Collins had given me, then called the chapel of rest to arrange an appointment, pushing the thought of viewing my sister’s body out of my mind, instead thinking about Nina’s London house. It had felt impersonal, impermanent, as though its occupants were passing through. Had it been deliberate on her part? A constant reminder to herself not to get too used to it, that there were better ways to live? I preferred that to the alternative, that she’d given up and hadn’t cared. That wasn’t how I remembered her. Even when things hadn’t been easy, she’d somehow always made the best of it.

  It seemed impossible that ten years had passed. Not when we were sisters, when it didn’t matter what had happened between us. How had so much time gone by without me finding her?

  I let my mind wander back to when I was seventeen. Nina had referred to her cottage as borrowed. I hadn’t thought about it before, but I’d never known who owned it. It had been miles from the nearest village, up a long road and with a dilapidated charm that perfectly suited her bohemian lifestyle.

  When I turned up there, she’d taken me in without hesitation, but then Nina had a generosity of spirit that had drawn people to her: weak, good-looking men, creative types, waifs and strays—that was how I’d thought of her eclectic, ever-changing household.

  They were carefree days, which had stretched seamlessly ahead of me, without reason to suspect anything would change, holding no suggestion of what was to come. Summer had been ten and Jude five, both of them used to people coming
and going, happily doing their own thing while the chaos of Nina’s life happened around them.

  Sometimes, they’d disappeared for hours. They must have ranged far enough to have met the nearest neighbors. The name Nell came to mind. I could dimly remember Summer telling me about picking strawberries from Nell’s garden, how one day they’d baked a cake. Then Summer had come running back, telling Nina about it.

  Neither of the children had gone to school. Nina had enthused about them having the carefree kind of childhood that was light-years from the upbringing she and I had known. Proudly, I remember her telling me how she’d elected to homeschool them. Children need space, Hannah. Freedom . . . Remember how we hated school? Look how happy they are! It’s what matters most, isn’t it? I’d watched a wistful look come over her face. I knew she was thinking of our own childhoods: the rules and restrictions, the cruel, controlling ways of our parents, and the violent consequences of disobeying them. It had been worse for Nina, her only escape to run to somewhere no one knew.

  Maybe it was a desire to leave the past behind. To believe that life could be different. Either way, we should have known you couldn’t trust people. Even in the cocoon she’d woven around them, Nina couldn’t protect her children. Nowhere was ever safe.

  The last time I went back to the cottage, just before she moved, I’d seen Jude only fleetingly, on his way out to meet friends. It was after Summer had gone. Abe had been sleeping. None of Nina’s hangers-on had been around, but everything had changed by then. Most of them had drifted away, so that it was just the two of us. Nina had opened a bottle of wine, but even though it was mid-morning, I knew from her overly bright eyes and the way she slurred her words that she was on something. There was a telltale half-drunk glass on the side that she ignored and I pretended not to see.

  Taking in the mess inside the cottage, as well as the state Nina was in, I couldn’t help but worry about the children. I tried to broach my concerns, but she was past listening to me. As she got angry, I weakly allowed myself to be diverted, but I was preoccupied with my own problems. My life had shrunk since the band had broken up, and my brief marriage to Nathan was on the rocks. Nina hadn’t liked Nathan, proclaiming him shallow and vain. I’d defended him, turning a blind eye to his unexplained absences and secretive phone calls, until the day came when he told me he’d met someone else.

  History was repeating itself . . . She was another singer, in another up-and-coming rock band, and they would inevitably last as long as the band was successful, I told myself. As I had . . . But she was welcome to him. I hadn’t really loved him, I knew that. I’d missed the buzz and excitement of being in the Cry Babies more than I missed Nathan. My pride had been dented, that was all. He belonged in a world I no longer had a part in.

  For a while, I’d had the idea of teaching music to private students. After the divorce, the house was mine, and I had some money, but not a huge amount, and I needed to keep it coming in. I’ll never forget how Nina hated that when success had been in my hand, I’d given up, as she saw it. She refused to let it go. This is your chance, Hannah. When you’ve come so far, I don’t understand how you can do this. People still know who you are. Most of us never get chances like this. She hadn’t understood that people knew me as part of a band that had glimpsed the sunshine briefly, before our moment had passed. I remembered how twitchy she was that morning, how quickly she drank her glass of wine and refilled it again.

  Abe would have been four years old at that point. In the years since, I’d often stopped to think about what his life had been like but assured myself Nina would have done her best to take care of him, the way she had the others—she was not perfect, I knew that, but no one was ever perfect.

  But with my own problems in the forefront of my life, the presence of Nina and her children had become like a photograph, there in the background, being slowly bleached by the sun, blurring their faces until I could read what I wanted into them—choosing happiness, freedom, love, instead of the struggle and isolation that really lay there.

  Then I thought of Abe’s face when I first saw him last night, when he’d followed DI Collins into the kitchen. There’d been no misreading how unemotional and switched off he’d seemed. It was as though he hadn’t heard anything I said to him. Maybe he’d learned to do that in order to cope with his life. If it had been dominated by Nina’s drinking, it couldn’t have been at all easy for him.

  However impossible the differences between me and Nina, I couldn’t deny the guilt weighing ever more heavily on me. Nor could I get rid of the feeling that I’d turned my back on them all, even though it was Nina who’d taken things into her own hands, moving and making the decision not to tell me where she’d gone. But I had tried. I’d gone back to her cottage that last time, only to find the windows closed and the front door ajar, creaking slightly as the wind caught it. Pushing it open, I’d ventured inside, moving from room to room, my agitation increasing as I found each of them empty. Apart from a mural she’d painted on her bedroom wall, and the garden she’d planted, that since she left, clearly hadn’t been tended to, there was no trace of her ever living there. I’d felt cold as the reality sank in. She’d effectively cut me out of her life.

  Standing there for a moment, I thought of all the people who had fleetingly passed through these rooms; of Nina’s children. Of Summer, who had been more vital than any of them. A whisper of that fateful evening came back to me before I blocked it out.

  Going outside, I sat on the doorstep, aware of a mixture of emotions. Sadness and loneliness were foremost, but I couldn’t hide the fact that I felt relief too, that I no longer had to answer to my sister or justify my choices to her. By leaving in this way, she’d granted me freedom—to make my own decisions, to be myself.

  “Jesus.” A movement startled me, jolting me back to the present. I hadn’t heard Abe’s feet on the creaky floorboards, just caught sight of his still figure framed in the doorway. “Sorry. I didn’t know you were there. You made me jump.”

  He stared at me, not moving; then after a few seconds, he looked away.

  “Would you like some breakfast?” I tried to sound bright as I got up and pulled out one of the chairs from under the table. “Take a pew. I’ll make some tea.”

  He did as I suggested, and I wondered if he’d slept. There were gray circles under his eyes, and his skin looked paler than yesterday, if that was possible. Compared to the teenagers who came here for music lessons, he looked younger than his fifteen years—and vulnerable. After putting the kettle on, I pulled out the chair opposite and sat down.

  “I’ve never been in a situation like this,” I said, studying his face. “I’d really like you to feel at home. Can you tell me what kind of thing you usually eat? Whether you like tea or coffee, that sort of thing?”

  Abe just shrugged.

  I tried again, puzzled. “I could make tea? Scrambled eggs?” Searching his face for clues and taking the slight jerk of his head as a nod, I got up again and went to the fridge to get some eggs, relieved there was no sign of yesterday’s hostility, not sure if his silence made things easier or harder.

  After he’d finished eating, he got up and walked outside, slamming the door behind him before Gibson could join him. Troubled, I was watching him walk across the garden when my mobile rang.

  “Ms. Roscoe? It’s DI Collins. How’s Abe?”

  “He’s OK—I think. He’s just had breakfast.” I hesitated, not wanting to sound unsympathetic, but I needed her to know how difficult this situation was. “But it’s hard to know. He’s hardly spoken. I’m not sure this is going to work, to be honest. On the way here last night, he made it clear he wanted to go back to London.”

  “Has he mentioned it again today?”

  “No. He’s just gone out. I assume for a walk. Unless . . . Oh God. I hope he hasn’t taken off . . .” I started to panic. “Maybe I should go and look for him.”

  “You’re not going to be able to keep him in your sight all the time.” Her voice wa
s reassuring. “He’ll probably come back soon enough. It’s a major change for him. He needs time to get used to things. Just see how it goes.” She paused. “Actually, I wanted to talk to you about your sister. The coroner wants to carry out a postmortem. It looks as though there was a second injury to her head.”

  “God.” Horrified, I imagined Nina falling and getting up, drunk and in pain, then falling again. “That’s awful. She must have fallen twice.”

  “It’s possible. We’ll know more when we get the pathologist’s report.” DI Collins was quiet for a moment.

  I was thinking suddenly. Did this change anything? “I’ve arranged to visit the chapel of rest later today. Is that still appropriate?”

  “If you could, it would be helpful.” She paused. “I know you have a lot to think about, but have you had a chance to contact any schools yet?”

  School already? “Not yet. And I’m not sure how keen he’ll be.”

  “I’m not suggesting he starts right away, but having a routine might be good for him. And it may be a good idea just to check out what the options are. It might be useful to speak to Abe’s school in London first. I’ve a phone number here. Do you have a pen?”

  “Hold on a moment . . .” I went to get my bag, rooting in the bottom until I found one, pulling out an old shopping list to write on. “OK.”

  As I wrote it down, the back door opened, and Abe came in. “He’s just come back.”

  “Good.” The DI sounded unsurprised. “I have to go, Ms. Roscoe, but I’ll be in touch as soon as I have any more to tell you.”

  Turning off my phone, I looked up. Abe was still standing there.

  “That was DI Collins,” I told him, not sure whether I should mention what the police officer had said about the second injury to Nina’s head. I decided against it. “She asked how you were. I did tell her that you weren’t happy moving so far from home.” I watched him apprehensively, wondering if it would trigger another outburst, but he just shrugged.