The Second Sister (31 page)

Chapter 41

T
hough I had never in my life needed wise counsel more than I did that day, there wasn't anyone to talk to. Celia and the rest of the FOA were obviously not speaking to me, and I wasn't speaking to Peter. Barney was away at his conference, and Joe Feeney was on a flight to Los Angeles, probably to meet with his deep-pocket developer client.

I even tried getting hold of Jenna, not that I thought she'd have much to offer or add, but I was desperate to talk to someone—anyone. My own thoughts and uncertainties were circling in a continuous loop, as pointless as a dog chasing its own tail.

Finally, I got into the car and started driving with no particular destination in mind, just wanting to get out of the house and outrun the tangle of emotions that clung to me like spiderwebs. I drove out to the lighthouse, now closed for the winter, then turned around and drove back, went past the turn for the house and back through town, passing the town hall, the market, the bookshop, the library, and The Library. I nearly passed St. Agnes's too. But then, suddenly, without really knowing why, I took a sharp, hard right, turning so quickly that the rear tires fishtailed and almost hit the curb.

The big oak doors to the church were unlocked, but heavy. I had to pull with both hands to open them.

I went inside, hearing my footsteps echo against the stone floor, breathing in the church scent of my childhood, a perfume mixed from dust and candle wax and damp wool. The dim winter sun coming through the banks of stained glass windows bathed the walls and floors in dull red, gold, and blue. The doors swung closed behind me with a soft but solid
thump
. I walked up the center aisle and, four pews from the front, crossed myself and sat down on the right-hand side.

It was incredibly quiet and still. I had a sudden feeling of—I don't quite know how to describe it—of expectation, I guess. As though I'd been summoned for an audience with some ancient and august monarch.

I sat there, waiting for something to happen. Nothing did.

After a few minutes I glanced down to my right and saw a book lying on the pew next to me, a copy of Augustine's
Confessions
—a book my mother had pored over constantly. It was still there, sitting in the bookcase at the cottage. I'd never opened it, but now I did and began to read....

The things I knew about myself, the things I had journeyed so long and hard to escape, had pursued me just the same. The actions I'd refused to acknowledge and memories I'd tried to expunge are written with indelible ink. I could not erase them. God knows I tried.

The answer was suddenly clear. Only myself.

There was a
click-click-click
and the overhead lights illuminated in three groups—back, center, and front. Father Damon's voice echoed off the high ceiling and limestone walls.

“Lucy? Is that you?”

He walked up the aisle and I quickly swiped at my eyes with the back of my hand.

“I was just coming to hear confessions. I don't get many takers in winter; maybe it's too cold to sin,” he said. “But just the same, I'm here every Wednesday from noon to one. Just in case someone needs me.”

He stopped at the end of the pew and turned to face me.

“Is there something I can help you with, Lucy?”

 

I told him everything. Not just about Peter and Celia and Maeve, but everything, the things I had never told anyone. We didn't go into the confessional; it was too late to hide behind a screen. Instead, we sat turned toward each other in the pew, face-to-face, talking. Actually, I did most of the talking. Father Damon responded now and then or urged me to go on, but mostly he just listened. There was a lot to listen to.

 

On that day, the day of the picnic, I'd had this plan—this stupid, childish plan—to get Peter's attention. I took the tip money I'd made at the restaurant, everything I'd earned for a month, and bought a bikini from one of those expensive boutiques in Fish Creek where the tourists go. It cost me a fortune and it was tiny and my mother would have had a fit if she saw it. I knew that so I hid it in the bottom drawer of my dresser, underneath a bunch of winter sweaters, because I didn't think she'd go looking in there.

She didn't. But Alice did.

She was looking for a pair of pink shorts she thought I'd borrowed, found the bikini, and showed it to Mom. Mom was furious and she yelled at me. And Alice? Alice just stood there, right behind Mom's right shoulder where she knew I could see, smirking.

I was angry. I was so,
so
angry. Not so much because she'd ratted me out, but because she enjoyed doing it. And also because, after Mom went off to church and Alice and I drove to the Tielens' house for the picnic, she kept teasing me about it, needling me about trying to flaunt myself and saying that, just because I'd finally grown a pair, did I really think that the boys were going to take any notice of me? And that even if they did, it would only be because they'd be hoping to cop a feel and that I'd be making a fool of myself, parading around in that outfit.

I'm not sure I could have put it into words back then, but I think I'd been anticipating the picnic as the day of my transformation. Not just the day when I'd capture Peter's attention—though I wanted that, too—but the day when I would become someone . . . different. Someone that other people wouldn't be able to overlook anymore. But Alice spoiled it for me, made me doubt myself, made me afraid that everything she'd said was true. That's why I was so angry. At that moment, I honestly think I hated her.

Of course, it was silly to think that a new bathing suit was going to change the course of my life, but I was sixteen. At sixteen you still believe in transformation. And I wasn't really wrong. In a sense, that bikini did change my life. Alice's too.

I wish I'd never laid eyes on it.

I was starting to feel that way even before we arrived at the picnic, but it was too late by then. The bikini was the only thing I had on under my shorts and top, and it was so incredibly hot. I told Denise I wanted to sit down on the far side, away from the crowd, but mostly away from Alice and her friends, who were already sitting there like a flock of fat hens, looking at me and snickering in a way that would make it clear that I was the one they were laughing at.

All of a sudden I thought,
Screw them!
I whipped off my top, stood there with my hands on my hips, and just stared daggers at them. After a minute or so of that, they started looking away and then turned their backs, trying to pretend I didn't exist. I stood there for a while more, just to make them miserable. While I was doing that, of course, everybody got a good look at my new bikini and my new bod, especially the boys.

It wasn't like they suddenly started swarming; they were more subtle than that. But not a lot more. I could feel their eyes on me.

At first I felt embarrassed. But after a little while I realized that the boys, unlike Alice and her crowd, weren't laughing at me. If anything, they were drooling. I was enjoying their reaction, the sense of power it gave me. For a minute, it felt like my fantasy was coming true, that this really was the day of my transformation.

The fantasy didn't last long.

I stretched myself out on the towel, making it even easier for the boys, and Peter in particular, to get a good look. Denise was sitting next to me, jabbering away about boys and sex, the two topics that dominated about 80 percent of her conversations. She was going on again, like she always did, about how I was probably the last virgin in our grade.

In retrospect, I realize that wasn't true, but at the time I actually believed her. It made me feel backward, as though I were wearing a really ugly outfit that I needed to shed as quickly as possible. But at the same time, I really didn't want to go through with it. I wanted that first time to be special, and everything Denise was describing to me sounded like the exact opposite of that, just steamy and sticky and cheap.

Anyway, I was starting to rethink the whole idea.

I wanted the boys—well, one boy, Peter—to notice me, but I wanted him to notice
me
. Not just my boobs and my body. But when he jumped out of the water and I saw that he was . . . aroused, I started remembering all the things that Alice had said in the car on the way over and I felt embarrassed and even angrier than I had before.

It was so ridiculous—it was just sister stuff, an older sister putting the younger in her place, the way siblings have done since the beginning of time, but for me, right then, it was more than that. It felt like she'd ruined everything, not just the day, but the whole way I saw myself in it. And the way I saw other people too. I suddenly felt like I couldn't trust my feelings for anyone else, or their feelings for me, and that I never could again.

Later, right after lunch, I saw Alice talking to Peter, flirting with him. She was doing it just to get to me, and it did. I walked over and challenged her to race me to the dock at the far side of the lake.

I don't know why I thought that was the way to get back at her, but at the time, it seemed like it was. Of course, Alice took me up on it. She was a much better swimmer than I was. She was probably the best in the whole school, as she was the best at so many things. But I was determined to redeem the day she had ruined for me and, for once, to be better than my sister.

We got into the water up to our ankles and everybody gathered on the shore to watch. Peter wished me good luck, but I'm sure he didn't think I had a chance. Nobody did.

Somebody shouted, “Go!” We dove into the water, and sure enough, Alice shot past me. I think she was swimming as fast as she'd ever swum, but so was I. All that fury I was feeling coursed through my arms and legs, making them whir like well-oiled pistons. Nothing could stop me. I wasn't going to give up for anything!

I sensed that I was closing the gap, could feel the flutter of Alice's kicks troubling the water just ahead of me. That's when I started to hear it, the muffled sound of voices, of clapping and cheering, getting louder as I came closer and threatened to rob Alice's lead. The sound affected me like a syringe full of adrenaline, filled me with an energy and determination I'd never had before.

Though my arms were aching and my lungs felt ready to burst, I kept swimming, faster than ever. I could feel Alice next to me, could sense her presence and her desire to stay ahead. We battled side by side for a few seconds until, finally, I passed her.

And when I did, she suddenly just wasn't there anymore. I didn't know if I was getting faster or if she'd just given up, but it didn't matter. I kept going, buoyed by the euphoria of knowing I had bested my sister and the roar of the crowd thrumming in my ears, a roar that got louder and more frenetic with each passing moment.

I thought they were cheering for me. I truly did. It wasn't until I reached the finish, grabbed the dock with both hands, and then leapt up and thrust my fist into the air in triumph that I understood that the frenzied shouting from the shore didn't signal excitement at my victory, but terror at my sister's disappearance.

The instant I knew what was happening, I joined in the search, but it took so long before she was found; she was under the water for so long.... I was too slow. Too late. Too busy beating her to even notice what had happened to her.

After they dragged Alice from the water and laid her on the shore, after she finally started breathing, the paramedics wouldn't let me ride with her. There wasn't room in the ambulance. Mr. Tielens drove me and followed right behind, those red lights flashing in my eyes like a strobe.

My parents arrived in separate cars, but at nearly the same moment. I'm not sure how long it was after I got there, but not a long time. I was still in my swimsuit, my hair dripping, my T-shirt sticking to me.

Mom started asking me questions, but I couldn't answer. I was crying too hard. The doctor came into the waiting room, told us that Alice was alive, but the prognosis wasn't good. He said there was always hope, but he didn't look like he believed it.

When the doctor left, Dad turned on me and started screaming, louder than he ever had screamed at me before, calling me all sorts of filthy names, pointing to my wet shirt, which was almost transparent over my breasts, screaming at me, “Where were you? Where were you? She saved you! You'd have frozen under the ice without Alice! Where
were
you?”

When she survived, everybody said it was a miracle. But in some sense, Alice—the Alice I knew—really did die that day. The Alice I knew was smart and quick and competitive, and, sometimes, a little bit cruel. Not often, but often enough. It wasn't a cruelty that was out of the ordinary for a teenage girl, an older sister trying to keep a younger sister in her place; even at the time I knew so, but that doesn't mean it didn't hurt.

Sometimes, when a person dies young, her survivors unconsciously revise her history, choosing to recall only what was good, the acts of kindness and inclinations to nobility, beatifying her memory until she becomes in death what she never was in life: a saint.