by Vivien Brown
Eve hadn’t hung around after the service, hadn’t approached us or tried to say anything. I couldn’t decide if that was her being diplomatic and caring, not wanting to risk a scene, or if she was just being downright cowardly. Yet a part of me longed for her to be here, the big sister I could lean on, the wise one who would know just what to do, taking over the nitty-gritty stuff I couldn’t cope with, as she had when Mum died, and injecting some of the strength I so badly needed but knew I lacked.
Janey loved her, and always had. Dad might be angry with her now, but he would come around. He had never been able to stay angry for long, not when it came to the precious daughters he had always insisted he loved in equal measure. No, Eve would be forgiven and welcomed back into the fold. And I wanted that too, to be supported and protected and loved as part of that close little group we called family, but she had lied to me. Again. I missed her so much, especially now, but I just couldn’t trust her.
I closed the door on the final guests soon after seven. Kisses, hugs, condolences, all over again. It was a cold November evening, starless dark, the skies still heavy with the threat of more rain, and all I wanted was to curl up on the sofa and be by myself. To let the events of the day sink in, to give in to the many conflicting feelings that came flooding in, and were in danger of overwhelming me. Pain, disbelief, anger, sorrow, fear, exhaustion and, much as I knew I could never admit to it now that it was all over, a growing sense of relief.
Colin had texted an hour or so before to see how I was, how the day had gone, but I hadn’t replied. This was Josh’s day and it wouldn’t seem right to spend any part of it communicating with the man I hoped might one day be his replacement. God, how callous that made me sound.
When I heard the front door opening, I looked up, expecting it to be Janey. She’d been out for a while. She’d be hungry. What I hadn’t expected was to see Eve standing there beside her. They were holding hands.
‘Sarah …’ She hesitated, probably as unsure as I was about how I might react. ‘Can I come in? Only, there’s something we need to tell you.’
We? Since when had she and my daughter been a we? Talk about feeling excluded in my own home. But there was something about the look on Janey’s face, and the way she clung to Eve’s hand, that made me relent. I nodded and sat myself up, beckoning them both in.
‘I’m sorry I didn’t … earlier. Well, you know how things are. I wasn’t sure I would be welcome, and all I really needed to do was say goodbye in my own way. I didn’t want to intrude.’
‘But you’re okay about intruding now?’
‘It’s not like that. This is about Janey, not you and me, not Josh.’
‘What about Janey?’
Eve slid her car keys into her bag and perched herself on the edge of an armchair. ‘Has Dad gone?’
‘He was tired. We all were. There’s just me.’
‘Janey’s told me something.’ She pulled Janey closer, their knees touching, although Janey seemed to want to remain standing. ‘About the baby.’
‘Has she?’ I turned towards my daughter who so far hadn’t said a word. ‘Janey?’ I held my arms out to her and she stumbled into them, the big gulping breaths as she sobbed out loud pressing up and down against my chest. ‘It’s all right, Janey. You can tell me. I love you. We’ve still got each other and, whatever it is, it will be all right, I promise you.’
***
I so wish Eve had told me, all those years ago, about Arnie O’Connor. How had she gone through something like that, a sexual assault that had frightened the life out of her, and not told anyone except Lucy? Not Mum and Dad, not the police, not even me, her own sister. I tried to think back to that night, but nothing stood out. Nothing brought it to mind as any different from other nights. She must have come home from the party late, gone to bed as normal and just kept it all inside, all that hurt and confusion and shame, and I hadn’t noticed a thing. Fast asleep, probably. And the next day, the next night, the next week, too busy with my own life, my petty jealousies, my hurt feelings because she was about to go off to uni and leave me behind, to see what was right in front of my face. What sort of a sister did that make me?
It explained a lot, of course. Her hiding away those last few weeks before she left, the absence of boyfriends, both then and now, the way she had kept even Josh, the so-called love of her life, at arm’s length for so long he’d turned to me instead.
And now, here he was again. Arnie O’Connor, all grown up, but still that same evil self-centred man. Without a woman in his life – oh, how I would love to know why his wife left him – and no doubt needing to feed his ego, his appetites … Not needing to resort to force this time, but putting on the charm, pretending to be kind, smarming his way into a young girl’s affections, into her knickers, into his bed. And not just any young girl. His daughter’s best friend. How sick and twisted is that? How could he do it? Why would he do it? Did it make him feel more of a man? The big comforting father figure he knew full well she was missing? Being what she needed, making her believe he cared? I shuddered to think how much worse it might have been if she had tried to resist him, the way Eve had …
The police took it all very seriously. Took statements. Brought in a specialist officer, a woman, who asked Janey questions, gently, sensitively. He denied it, of course. Put it all down to the wild imaginings of a silly young girl with a crush. What evidence did they have, after all? But the evidence was there, growing inside her, and with it the DNA that we knew would prove it was all true. So what if she was willing, what if she gave consent? He made out the whole thing had been her idea, that she had taken the lead. Would anyone really believe that? The lies and excuses poured out of him, but the facts were indisputable. He was thirty-eight. And she was fourteen. It was against the law, and the law was not going to let him get away with it.
Six months later
Becky didn’t go back to school. We heard that, since Arnie’s arrest, she and her brother had moved back permanently to live with their mother and had been enrolled elsewhere. Janey wrote her a long letter, telling her she missed her and didn’t blame her at all, but it was never answered.
Eve’s boss had a stroke and decided to retire, and she was offered the headship which, after a few anxious days of self-doubt, she agreed to accept. She’s been seeing a lot of Lucy, I think mainly because she loves playing with her little godson so much. Simon and Gregory drive over regularly to visit now too, and Eve tells me they are thinking of trying to adopt, so hopefully she’ll soon have another godchild to dote on. I do feel sorry that she never had children of her own, but she’s not forty yet. It’s not too late. Maybe, in time …
With both her best friends back in her life and a new challenging job to really get her teeth into, I don’t think I’ve ever seen her more settled and more positive about her life. The statement she gave to the police about what Arnie did to her when she was eighteen might all come to nothing. It’s not easy to prove something from that long ago, but just doing it has made her feel better, freer, more in control, and he’s going to prison anyway, no matter what.
There’s still no love interest in her life, but I think it’s going to take her a long time to get over Josh (longer than it will take me, that’s for sure) and she’s always been more than a little in love with her career. Janey is in her English class now, coming home waving paint charts and poetry books about, and loves every minute.
And Janey’s baby? She couldn’t go through with having it. Not once she knew the truth about its father and had had time to consider the effect it would have on her life, her education, her future. It was her decision, not mine, just as it had to be, although I admit I breathed a massive sigh of relief when she made it. It was probably the decision I should have been brave enough to make for myself when I’d been in her position all that time ago, if only the Catholic in-laws and the raging hormones and the stupid trying to get one up on my sister hadn’t led me in the opposite direction.
The abortion was tra
umatic and emotional, as I’m sure any abortion must be, but we both went with her, Eve and me, and saw her through it, tears and all. And then we went home and put her to bed and sat up for hours drinking and reminiscing. About the good times we’d had as kids, walking old Buster the dog, the two of us decorating the Christmas tree, and how much we still missed Mum. Josh’s name wasn’t mentioned at all.
Slowly, we’ve slipped back into sisterhood. The only thing that had kept us apart, put us at loggerheads on so many occasions, made us into suspicious rivals and reluctant enemies, had been Josh, and now he’s gone.
The evening I introduced her to Colin, I watched her every move. I couldn’t let her swoop in on another man and take him from me. But of course, I was being ridiculous. Eve has no interest in Colin, other than as the man she can see is making me happy again. I didn’t tell her, or Janey, that our relationship had begun longer ago than I let them assume. As far as they knew, we had met at the hospital, while I was recovering. A patient, already separated from her husband, meets a handsome single doctor and six months later starts to date him. It could have come straight from a Mills & Boon. Even Janey approves.
I still have nightmares though. I don’t particularly like sleeping alone. The dark closes in, and the flames flare up again, and I feel the heat on my hands, where the scars still map out their story.
Tonight we drank too much Merlot, Eve and me, and she couldn’t risk driving home. For the first time since we were teenagers, we are sharing a room, lying next to each other in my double bed with the curtains open, looking out at the inky black sky.
‘Do you remember how we used to make stars?’ I whisper, not sure if she’s still awake.
She stretches out her legs in a V, bumping one into mine, and then does the same with her arms.
‘Reaching out for our own dreams but always close enough to touch.’ She links her fingers through mine.
‘We’re okay now, aren’t we?’ I say.
‘Yes, Sprout. I think we are,’ she mumbles as she drifts off to sleep.
There’s no bond like it. Sisters. We had come so close to breaking it forever, but we’re back. She’s even calling me by my old childhood nickname again. Sprout! I like it. Now all I have to do is find a way to stop the nightmares, the memories, the horror, that still finds me, even on nights like this when all feels so right with the world. But I can’t stop them. I never can.
I see it all happening again, as I always do, like a play being acted out on the inside of my eyelids. The lorry hurtling towards us, its horn blaring. The car rolling, out of control, crashing into the tree. The broken glass, the smell of petrol, the wisps of smoke. I look across at Josh, his head lolling forward, his eyes closed, and I am so scared. I manage to open the door, crawl out, hobble round to his side of the car. I hurt. There is a stabbing pain in my stomach, and in my leg. People are coming. Shouting. Telling me to get back, wait for the ambulance, the fire engines.
It’s hot now. I push the duvet back to try to get some air. There are flames creeping, licking at the engine and I can see him, inside the car, my car, his eyes flickering open, his hand trying to lift itself, pushing at the steering wheel that’s crushing against his chest. I have seconds, just seconds to open that door and pull him out. Seconds to save my husband. I grab the door handle. It feels stiff, hard, hot. It burns. He’s looking out at me, frightened, his eyes pleading for help. But I don’t do it. I can’t do it. I can’t help him, can’t forgive him, can’t save him. He has hurt me too badly. The fire is too fierce. If I stay, it’s going to take me too.
I let go of the door as the flames leap higher and engulf the car. Someone grabs me from behind and pulls me away as everything explodes.
I wake up sweating, shaking, Eve still asleep beside me, blissfully unaware of what’s happening in my head. Of what I have done. I lie there for a while, waiting for my breathing to slow, looking at the ceiling. My ceiling now. My bedroom. My house. All mine. I have the bank account, the life insurance money, the pension. I have my daughter, sad but whole again, with her life stretching out ahead of her, full of all the possibilities I so casually threw away. We hadn’t started the divorce, nothing was official, so in the eyes of the law, and of his parents, we were married to the end. Surrounded by his things, I can almost pretend he never left. Those months we lived apart were simply a twist in time, a temporary hiccup, a bump in the road. He was still my husband. I was still his wife. But not anymore. I am a widow now.
Widow. I hate the word. It smacks of black cloaks and closed blinds and musty flowers and bereavement cards, but it’s what I am. Not exactly a merry widow, but certainly a recovering one who has already thrown off the bleak black clothes and is wearing red again.
And, at last, I have my sister back. I close my eyes, pull the duvet up to my chin and try to sleep, feeling her warm toes lying next to my cold ones, her gentle breathing, tinged with the stale waft of wine, against my neck, her body still star-shaped beside me. It feels just like old times. Good times.
They say I’m a heroine, that I risked my own life to try to save Josh’s, but it’s not true. Maybe I could have – should have – tried harder, tugged harder at that handle, but I didn’t. I let go. And I let him go too.
Because, sometimes, when everything else seems lost, the only thing you can do is save yourself.
THE END
If you enjoyed No Sister of Mine, you can find Vivien Brown’s other books right here if you’re in the UK and here if you’re in the US!
In the mood for even more heart-pounding thrillers to keep you racing through the pages?
You will adore The Murder House by Michael Wood, a gripping crime thriller of dark secrets and darker deeds starring the inimitable DCI Matilda Darke in the streets of Sheffield.
Click here if you’re in the UK.
Click here if you’re in the US.
You will also love The Beach by Sarah Linley, an unputdownable thriller following four friends when their backpacking adventure to Thailand goes horribly, irrevocably wrong.
Click here if you’re in the UK.
Click here if you’re in the US.
And why not try the similarly enthralling Flowers for the Dead by C. K. Williams, an irresistibly tense suspense thriller set amidst the haunted heaths of Yorkshire.
Click here if you’re in the UK.
Click here if you’re in the US.
Acknowledgements
First of all, I must thank Irving Berlin. Not that we ever met (I have never been to America and he has been dead for more than thirty years), but it was the lyrics of his song ‘Sisters’, written in 1954 for the movie ‘White Christmas’, that sparked the idea for this novel. When two sisters are close, there’s usually only one thing that is likely to come between them – a man they both have their eye on! As the song says, ‘God help the mister who comes between me and my sister …’ Copyright rules prevent me from quoting much more, but I’m sure you know the rest.
I come from a family of sisters. For the last four generations, my direct family line has not seen the birth of a single boy. My mum was one of two sisters and so was I. When my dad embarked on a second marriage late in life, what happened? Yes, another baby girl was born, adding a half-sister to the mix. Then I had twin girls, and now my younger daughter has two little girls of her own. So a big shout-out to all of them, and to sisters everywhere. It’s a unique bond, based on the sharing of bedrooms, secrets and hand-me-down clothes, with love, friendship and usually a fair amount of rivalry thrown in. As sibling relationships go, I know no other.
As I emerge from my study, after months of scribbling and tapping away at my novel with just my characters, my goldfish, and a secret stash of chocolate for company, my thanks must go to my husband, Paul, who doesn’t usually have a clue what it is I am writing about, rarely reads any of it, and is the first to admit he could never do it himself in a million years. His idea of a good read tends to be of the action thriller kind, involving air disasters or car chases,
so when it comes to fiction we are not really on the same page, but he fully supports me just the same, I think in the vain hope that the proceeds of a future bestseller might just allow me one day to buy him a Lamborghini!
As always, I owe a huge debt to the various writers’ groups and societies to which I belong, especially the Society of Women Writers and Journalists (SWWJ) which celebrated its 125th anniversary in 2019 and recently did me the honour of making me a Fellow. And love and thanks must also go to my many fiction-writing and romantic novelist friends, especially the ones I meet up with in real life rather than just on Facebook, who continue to encourage and support each other through the perilous ups and downs on the bumpy but always exciting journey to publication we all share. You all know who you are.
Thanks also to my editor and friend Kate Bradley – especially as, sadly, this is the last book we will be working on together – and to publisher Charlotte Ledger, assistant editor Bethan Morgan, copy editor Lydia Mason, and the whole team at One More Chapter for continuing to believe in me and to publish and promote my books.
I am eternally grateful too, to all the book bloggers, reviewers, and especially the readers, who say such lovely things about my novels. I don’t mind whether you read on a screen, buy the paperback or borrow it from the library, as long as you keep turning the pages and enjoying the story inside. It’s a scary, nail-biting moment when a new novel gets released into the world, and I do hope that this one has lived up to expectations. If you liked it, please take a moment to share your thoughts on Amazon or Goodreads. Even a very short review means so much. Authors and their work, and the sheer joy of reading and talking about books, could not continue to thrive and grow without you, the readers. Of all the hundreds of thousands of novels published every year, thank you so much for choosing to read mine.