Like It Never Happened (24 page)

I thought of the alternative: more private panic. More cold sweat. More of my mother's petulant silence.

“Yes, please,” I answered.

Satisfied, Mary pulled an awkward U-turn. The most surprising part was my excitement, stemming from something so simple and strange: more time with my sister.

W
e crossed the steel bridge and merged onto Highway 30 toward Sauvie Island, where Nadine lived alone in her grandmother's old farmhouse. Mary got slightly choked up on the subject of Nadine's grandmother, whom she kept calling “Grandma P.” I didn't know how she could possibly cry over a relative that wasn't even ours.

But then Mary told me how bad things had gotten for Nadine after the prom. Her excessively religious parents—having heard about the slow dance to Mazzy Star, having pried the word
gay
from Nadine's lips— practically threw her out of the house. It was Grandma P who gave Nadine enough money to move to New York. Enough money, even, to bring Mary along.

Driving across the bridge to the island, Mary fell silent. Her nervousness was palpable. I couldn't imagine how it would feel to see a former best friend after so many years, let alone a former best-friend-turned-lover, turned partner-in-dramatic-exodus, turned roommate-in–New York City. I tried to imagine driving to Mr. McFadden's house, ten years from now.

Strangely, the fantasy was appealing, and I slipped into it. Maybe he would invite me over for coffee, just to chat about the industry. “I'm not surprised in the least,” he would say in reference to my wildly successful career.

The road we were on was narrow, but empty, curving broadly around tree orchards and fields of grazing horses. The rain had stopped and pale sunlight bled through a crack in the clouds. Mary was chewing on her bottom lip, slowing down to read a street sign.

“It's been a while,” she apologized, making a sharp right.

This road soon turned to gravel. We bumped up to a clapboard house with wooden shingles and green shutters, like something from a picture book.

Mary killed the engine but sat still, white-knuckling the steering wheel. “Do I look okay?” She turned to me, her face taut with anxiety but otherwise the same as always. I nodded. We got out of the car.

I don't know what I was expecting, but when Nadine threw open the front door, something about her face shocked me. She looked ghostly and dazed, but also extremely familiar. She had wide-set eyes and a long, fragile nose. I felt like I had seen her every day of my life.

“Hey,” she said softly, trembling as she wrapped her thin arms around Mary's shoulders.

Mary was uncharacteristically silent.

“You brought Rebecca.” Nadine smiled and hugged me too, making minimal contact. “Come inside. It's so cold.”

We followed her through a living room of futons and knit blankets and into a kitchen. Nadine wore her hair in a braid so long it grazed the small of her back. She was about six feet tall and as skinny as possible. My sister wasn't exactly short, but next to Nadine she appeared compact and hearty, capable of weathering a storm.

Nadine offered us tea. Just to be polite, Mary pretended to consider it.

“I'm kidding.” Nadine smiled slightly. “I know better than to offer you tea.” She punched a button on the coffeemaker and urged us to sit at a circular wooden table.

“So,” began Nadine. “Are you still painting?” She had a funny, detached way of talking—a little bit like a movie voice-over exposing the thoughts of a disturbed heroine.

“Yeah,” said Mary bluntly. “I mean, not lately. Jeffrey and I have been staying with his parents in Lake Oswego. I'm dying to get home, but it's so much more convenient to plan the wedding locally.”

I blinked at her. She sounded exactly like our mother.

“I have a great setup in Santa Cruz, a whole studio to myself. And I'm pretty well established within the art fair circuit.”

Nadine just nodded.

Groaning, Mary collapsed upon her forearms. “Listen to me.
Art fair circuit
. I sound like—”

“No.” Nadine put a hand on Mary's shoulder and quickly withdrew it. “That all sounds great. I'm just nervous. I don't know what to say.”

Mary looked desperately toward the coffeemaker still dripping and hissing. “What about you?” she asked. “What are you doing?”

Nadine reached across the table to fiddle with a saltshaker. “I'm a manager at The Rectory Café.” She nodded toward the window to indicate a restaurant nearby. “Not exactly ambitious.”

“Still don't know what you want to be when you grow up?” asked Mary.

Nadine frowned.

Mary winced. “Sorry.”

“No.” Nadine shook her head earnestly. “Don't apologize.”

It was getting hard to believe that these people had once shared an apartment, let alone a bed. The coffeemaker drew a final tortured breath and then fell silent. I jumped up from my chair, like I might make myself useful.

“Sit,” commanded Nadine. She located three mismatched mugs and a carton of cream. The coffee at least gave us something to do with our hands.

“So,” said Nadine, creeping toward new territory. “How's the mother-in-law?”

I thought it was weird of her to ask about Mrs. Cline, and not about Jeffrey.

“Not my number one fan,” answered Mary.

“No?”

My sister shook her head. “She thinks I'm dramatic and self-involved.”

“You are.”

They met each other's eyes over their mugs. I think my jaw might have dropped; I couldn't believe Nadine had said that so frankly. But if anything, Mary seemed amused. Or relieved.

“God.” Nadine shifted in her seat to stare at me. “You're so beautiful.”

“I know!” said Mary, like I wasn't even there. “It's ridiculous.”

“Your sister has always been jealous of your good looks,” Nadine said to me. I couldn't tell if Nadine was good-looking or not. Speech caused her features to twist in unexpected ways.

Mary flipped her hand dismissively. “Not jealous,” she said. “Just resigned.”

“Are you still acting?” Nadine asked me.

My heart sank. It was the opposite of waking from a bad dream and letting the pleasant pieces of reality fall into place. “I'm taking a break,” I said.

Nadine didn't question this. She just nodded, like it was perfectly natural to take a break from the only thing I had ever done.

“Speaking of breaks!” Mary spoke brightly, sounding again like our mother, but now with an edge. “Let's give ourselves one.” She moved across the room and threw open cabinet doors at random. Nadine watched, faintly amused. With a masculine grunt Mary jumped for the top shelf and landed with a bottle of amber-colored liquor.

I half expected Nadine to protest. Her kitchen was very neat, and she seemed fairly reserved—not necessarily like she would approve of drinking in the present circumstances. She watched Mary splash nominal amounts of booze into two cups, and tensed a little when Mary reached for a third.

“Don't worry,” preempted Mary. “My little sister is no tequila virgin. I once caught her sneaking a bottle from my parents' liquor cabinet at ten in the morning.”

Without missing a beat, Nadine said, “I'm surprised there's anything left in that cabinet to steal.”

I couldn't help relishing that moment. It was like Mary had drawn a line from the two of them in high school to me, present day, clutching my half shot of tequila in the farmhouse kitchen—where I apparently belonged.

Either the effect of the drinks was immediate, or the alcohol was just an excuse for Mary and Nadine to relax.

“Your fiancé's okay with this?” Nadine slumped down in her chair and eyed Mary mischievously.

“With what?” asked Mary, all innocence.

“Absconding to a remote island. Drinking with an estranged lover.”

Mary snorted. “He knows where my loyalties lie.”

“Good,” said Nadine, like she meant something else.

My sister thrust her tongue against the inside of her cheek, struggling to phrase a question. “Are you . . . partnered?”

Nadine nodded.

“Well?”

“Disaster. I need to break up with her. I just can't seem to do it.”

Mary considered this. “Maybe you should leave town.”

Nadine's eyes rolled toward the ceiling. She failed to suppress a grin. “Fuck you,” she whispered.

The rhythm of their talk reminded me a little of the Essential Five in our prime. But this was different, I realized. Beneath the surface of their conversation lay a thousand other conversations—which they were somehow having simultaneously, and without acknowledgment.

I could have listened to them indefinitely, the twin buzzes of caffeine and tequila bringing the kitchen into sharp focus. But Mary rose from her chair after about an hour. She claimed she had “kidnapped” me, and that she needed to get me home before our mother issued an Amber Alert. Nadine just nodded, recognizing this excuse for what it was.

My sister and I took our time zipping our coats and winding our scarves around our necks. The three of us gathered on the porch to say good-bye.

Their first embrace was insubstantial. Then Mary yanked Nadine closer. She clung to Nadine's shoulder blades somewhat desperately, like she was trying to memorize the shape of her old friend. Nadine didn't exactly squirm, but there was an element of endurance in the way she stood. Like she recognized Mary's need without harboring the same need herself.

“I'm sorry,” mumbled my sister.

“For what?” asked Nadine.

“For making out with Heidi Cho in the parking lot of the Meow Meow.”

Nadine half gasped, half chuckled. When they pulled apart, they stared briefly into each other's eyes. I felt intrusive, like I was watching them kiss. For a second I thought they might. But Mary made the decision to turn on her heel, and the weight of their intimacy just kind of dissipated.

In the car, the stereo resumed playing The Smiths. Morrissey was singing about the sea wanting to take him and the knife wanting to cut him. I felt very tired. Mary started driving and five minutes later still hadn't said a word, which for some reason bothered me.

“That was intense,” I said.

She half smiled at me. “It was, wasn't it?”

“Do you think she'll come to the wedding?” I asked.

“Nah.” Mary checked her rearview mirror as we drove across the bridge, away from the island.

Her indifference pissed me off. I guess I was jealous; the level of closeness between Nadine and Mary wasn't something I had ever shared with anyone. Maybe for half a second with Liane, or with Mr. McFadden while the rain pounded against the roof of his car. Even then, the intimacy had been mostly in my head. Mary could have been loved by Nadine for the rest of her life.

We passed beneath a weather-worn billboard proclaiming
SMOKING KILLS LIVES
.

“I hate that billboard!” cried Mary. “I can't believe it's still there!”

I stared at her profile.

“You can't kill a life!” she shouted with conviction.

I started laughing.

“That's not how English works,” she insisted.

My laughter yielded to a sob. I was feeling somewhat hysterical.