Sister: A Novel (2 page)

I went first class, it was the only seat they had left. As we flew through cloud limbo land I imagined telling you off for putting me through this. I made you promise not to pull a stunt like this again. I reminded you that you were going to be a mother soon and it was about time you started behaving like an adult.

‘“Older sister” doesn’t need to be a job title, Bee.’

What had I been lecturing you about at the time? It could have been one of so many things; the point is that I’ve always viewed being an older sister as a job, one that I am ideally suited for. And as I flew to find you, because I would find you (looking after you is an essential part of my job description), I was comforted by the familiar scenario of being the superior, mature, older sister telling off the flighty, irresponsible young girl who should know better by now.

The plane started to descend towards Heathrow. West London sprawled beneath us, thinly disguised with snow. The seat-belt light came on and I made deals with God: I’d do anything if you were found safe. I’d have made a deal with the devil if he’d been offering.

As the plane bumped clumsily onto the tarmac, my fantasy annoyance crumbled into sickening anxiety. God became the hero in a children’s fairy story. My powers as an older sister dwindled to still impotency. I remembered viscerally Leo’s death. Grief like swallowed offal made me wretch. I couldn’t lose you too.

The window is surprisingly huge for an office and spring sunshine floods through it.

‘So you made a connection between Tess’s disappearance and Leo’s death?’ Mr Wright asks.

‘No.’

‘You said you thought about Leo?’

‘I think about Leo all the time. He was my brother.’ I’m tired of going through this. ‘Leo died of cystic fibrosis when he was eight. Tess and I didn’t inherit it, we were born perfectly healthy.’

Mr Wright tries to turn off the glaring overhead light, but for some reason it won’t switch off. He shrugs at me apologetically and sits down again.

‘And then what happened?’ he asks.

‘Mum met me and I went to the police station.’

‘Can you tell me about that?’

Mum was waiting at the arrivals gate wearing her Jaeger camel coat. As I got closer, I saw that she hadn’t brushed her hair and her make-up was clumsily applied. I know; I hadn’t seen her that way since Leo’s funeral.

‘I got a taxi all the way from Little Hadston. Your plane was late.’

‘Only ten minutes, Mum.’

All around us lovers and relatives and friends were hugging each other, reunited. We were physically awkward with each other. I don’t think we even kissed.

‘She might have been trying to phone while I’ve been gone,’ Mum said.

‘She’ll try again.’

But I’d checked my mobile countless times since the plane had landed.

‘Ridiculous of me,’ continued Mum. ‘I don’t know why I should expect her to phone. She’s virtually given up calling me. Too much bother, I suppose.’ I recognised the crust of annoyance. ‘And when was the last time she made the effort to visit?’

I wondered when she’d move on to pacts with God.

I rented a car. It was only six in the morning but the traffic was already heavy on the M4 into London; the frustrated, angry crawl of the absurdly named rush hour, made even slower because of the snow. We were going straight to the police station. I couldn’t make the heater work and our words were spoken puffs hanging briefly in the cold air between us. ‘Have you already talked to the police?’ I asked.

Mum’s words seemed to pucker in the air with annoyance. ‘Yes, for all the good it did. What would I know about her life?’

‘Do you know who told them she was missing?’

‘Her landlord. Amias something or other,’ Mum replied.

Neither of us could remember his surname. It struck me as strange that it was your elderly landlord who reported you missing to the police.

‘He told them that she’d been getting nuisance calls,’ said Mum.

Despite the freezing car, I felt clammy with sweat. ‘What kind of nuisance calls?’

‘They didn’t say,’ said Mum. I looked at her. Her pale anxious face showed around the edge of her foundation, a middle-aged geisha in Clinique bisque.

It was seven thirty but still winter-dark when we arrived at the Notting Hill police station. The roads were jammed but the newly gritted pavements were almost empty. The only time I’d been in a police station before was to report the loss of my mobile phone; it hadn’t even been stolen. I never went past the reception area. This time I was escorted behind reception into an alien world of interview rooms and cells and police wearing belts loaded with truncheons and handcuffs. It had no connection to you.

‘And you met Detective Sergeant Finborough?’ Mr Wright asks.

‘Yes.’

‘What did you think of him?’

I choose my words carefully. ‘Thoughtful. Thorough. Decent.’

Mr Wright is surprised, but quickly hides it. ‘Can you remember any of that initial interview?’

‘Yes.’

To start with I was dazed by your disappearance, but then my senses became overly acute; I saw too many details and too many colours, as if the world was animated by Pixar. Other senses were also on heightened alert; I heard the clank of the clock’s hand, a chair leg scraping on linoleum. I could smell a cigarette clinging to a jacket on the door. It was white noise turned up full volume, as if my brain could no longer tune out what didn’t matter. Everything mattered.

Mum had been taken off by a WPC for a cup of tea and I was alone with DS Finborough. His manner was courteous, old-fashioned even. He seemed more Oxbridge don than policeman. Outside the window I could see it was sleeting.

‘Is there any reason you can think of why your sister may have gone away?’ he asked.

‘No. None.’

‘Would she have told you?’

‘Yes.’

‘You live in America?’

‘We phone and email each other all the time.’

‘So you’re close.’

‘Very.’

Of course we are close. Different yes, but close. The age gap has never meant distance between us.

‘When did you last speak to her?’ he asked.

‘Last Monday, I think. On Wednesday we went away to the mountains, just for a few days. I did try phoning her from a restaurant a few times but her landline was always engaged; she can chat to her friends for hours.’ I tried to feel irritated - after all, it’s me that pays your phone bill; trying to feel an old familiar emotion.

‘What about her mobile?’

‘She lost it about two months ago, or it was stolen. She’s very scatty like that.’ Again trying to feel irritated.

DS Finborough paused a moment, thinking of the right way to phrase it. His manner was considerate. ‘So you think her disappearance is not voluntary?’ he asked.

‘Not voluntary.’ Gentle words for something violent. In that first meeting no one said the word ‘abduction’, or ‘murder’. A silent understanding had been reached between DS Finborough and me. I appreciated his tact; it was too soon to name it. I forced out my question. ‘My mother told me she’d been getting nuisance calls?’

‘According to her landlord, yes, she has. Unfortunately she hadn’t given him any details. Has Tess told you anything about them?’

‘No.’

‘And she didn’t say anything to you about feeling frightened or threatened?’ he asked.

‘No. Nothing like that. She was normal; happy.’ I had my own question. ‘Have you checked all the hospitals?’ As I asked it, I heard the rudeness and implicit criticism. ‘I just thought she might have gone into labour early.’

DS Finborough put his coffee down, the sound made me jump.

‘We didn’t know she was pregnant.’

Suddenly there was a lifebuoy and I swam for it. ‘If she’d gone into labour early, she could be in hospital. You wouldn’t have checked the maternity wards, would you?’

‘We ask hospitals to check all their in-patients, which would include maternity,’ he replied and the lifebuoy slipped away.

‘When’s the baby due?’ he asked.

‘In just under three weeks.’

‘Do you know who the father is?’

‘Yes. Emilio Codi. He’s a tutor at her art college.’

I didn’t pause, not for a heartbeat. The time for discretion was over. DS Finborough didn’t show any surprise, but then maybe that’s part of police training.

‘I went to the art college—’ he began, but I interrupted. The smell of coffee in his Styrofoam cup had become nauseatingly strong.

‘You must be very worried about her.’

‘I like to be thorough.’

‘Yes, of course.’

I didn’t want DS Finborough to think me hysterical, but reasonable and intelligent. I remember thinking it shouldn’t matter what he thought of me. Later I would discover that it mattered a great deal.

‘I met Mr Codi,’ said DS Finborough. ‘He didn’t say anything about his relationship with Tess, other than as a former student.’

Emilio still disowned you, even when you were missing. I’m sorry. But that’s what his ‘discretion’ always was - disownership hiding behind a more acceptable noun.

‘Do you know why Mr Codi wouldn’t want us to know about their relationship?’ he asked.

I knew it all too well. ‘The college doesn’t allow tutors to have sex with their students. He’s also married. He made Tess take a “sabbatical” when the bump started to show.’

DS Finborough stood up; his manner had shifted up a gear, more policeman now than Oxbridge don. ‘There’s a local news programme we sometimes use for missing people. I want to do a televised reconstruction of her last known movements.’

Outside the metal-framed window a bird sang. I remembered your voice, so vividly that it was like you were in the room with me:

‘In some cities birds can’t hear each other any more above the noise. After a while they forget the complexity and beauty of each other’s song.’

‘What on earth’s that got to do with me and Todd?’ I asked.

‘Some have given up birdsong altogether, and faultlessly imitate car alarms.’

My voice was annoyed and impatient. ‘Tess.’

‘Can Todd hear your song?’

At the time I dismissed your student intensity of emotion as something I’d grown out of years before. But in that police room I remembered our conversation again, because thoughts about birdsong, about Todd, about anything, was an escape from the implications of what was happening. DS Finborough sensed my distress. ‘I think it’s better to err on the side of caution. Especially now I know she’s pregnant.’