When We Were Sisters (34 page)

42

Robin

If a bystander asked me to make a bet on who was about to win the argument escalating in front of me, I would decline. Watching two strong personalities locked in combat was fascinating. Who would be foolish enough to favor one over the other?

The challengers? Mick and Cecilia, halfway between the Osburn ranch barn and house. Both, at the moment, holding their own.

Cecilia was appropriately dressed for a ranch, although more California dude than hand-to-mouth working. Her hair curled halfway down her back, clipped back from her face with broad turquoise barrettes. She wore faux-leather cowboy boots embroidered with palm trees, a studded denim shirt and wheat-colored jeans tailored to every curve. By itself each item costs more than all the clothing we bought together during the years we lived here.

She was speaking softly and slowly, as if to make her point with as much tact as possible.

“I understand where you're coming from, Mick. I know you think if I go inside without the crew, you won't get the shots you really want later. They'll be hashed over and edited in my head.”

Mick's voice was equally melodious, but an edge was forming. “Cecilia, if you understand, why are you insisting?”

“Because I'm a better actor than you give me credit for.”

“I know how good you are.” Mick, wearing his usual jeans and T-shirt, looked casual enough, but the easygoing filmmaker has a ramrod backbone, and today he needed it.

“Then you know I can do this.” I watched Cecilia rest her hand on his arm. I could almost feel her fingertips digging in. “More important, though, you need to know that I'm not going in there at
all
unless I can go in without the crew first. You know what a good sport I've been. And you've been amazing. You've made this doable, and I appreciate every single accommodation you've made for me. But honestly? This isn't a request.”

Mick made one more stab at getting his way. “I know this will be hard. But I'd like to see how hard on film. Remember, at the end you have the right to edit out any shot you don't want viewers to see.”

She smiled her Cecilia-onstage smile and clasped her hands in front of her. “No.”

And so, it was over. When Cecilia makes up her mind, that's it.

Donny stepped forward, but I noticed that he angled his body away from my sister's, as if to keep her out of his sight line. “Mick, you're sure the house was thoroughly checked? She'll be safe in there by herself?”

“
We'll
be safe in there,” Cecilia corrected him. “I want Robin with me. And, Mick, to make you a little happier, Robin can bring her camera.”

This was news. As usual Cecilia had left me out of negotiations. “Wait a minute,” I said. “Nobody asked me.”

Cecilia glanced over her shoulder. “Mick assured me it's safe. Somebody's done some work in the past months to make sure it doesn't tumble down with us inside. Will you come with me?”

“That's better.”

She smiled her wheedling smile. “It would mean a lot.”

I wasn't looking forward to being in the house. Last night I'd lain awake for hours, sorry my memory banks were still filled with Osburn ranch images circa 1990. But I have to go inside at some point to take photos. I've known this moment was coming. And going in alone with Cecilia? Maybe that would help us both put ghosts to rest.

My nod was more like a tic, but she smiled a more natural smile at me, although not at Donny.

Everyone had eaten together in Tampa before packing up to move to the ranch for this final shoot. The campers arrived at the campground yesterday as promised, and this morning we spent a little time after our arrival moving in. My children would love overnighting in mine, with everything in miniature and easy to reach. They would love it, but I'm so grateful they're not here. Because what would I tell them that they could hear?

Yesterday I was busy with crew meetings most of the day, and Cecilia stayed out of everybody's way. I don't know where Donny spent his time, but I didn't see him until breakfast this morning. It's pretty clear from the way they're avoiding each other that he and my sister aren't happy.

“When do you want to do this?” Donny's expression was carefully blank.

Cecilia looked as if the real answer would be “never,” but she caught my eye. “Are we ready?”

“Let me get my equipment.”

“Not a lot, okay? Just a few photos.”

She didn't want me to be distracted. That was easy to see. I was sorry, since distraction sounded like a good thing. I promised to meet her back at the house in ten minutes.

She and Mick walked toward the front porch and I started back to my car, where I had stowed my equipment. I had kept my rental car, although I hadn't needed to. I could have gotten here in the crew vans with everyone else, but the car was my security. If necessary I could leave anytime I wanted. Apparently Cecilia felt the same, because she'd fetched hers from town this morning instead of asking the rental agency to take it back. I'm not sure where either of us thinks we'll go, but knowing we can go somewhere makes this easier.

Donny joined me, and we walked in silence for a few moments before he went right to the point. “I've given Cecilia notice. I don't know if she'll tell you herself, but I wanted you to hear it from me.”

I was stunned enough to stop walking. “That's crazy. The two of you are great together.”

He looked tired, as if he'd gotten as little sleep as I had. “It just isn't working. She needs somebody more objective. I can't back off the way I used to. And that's what she thinks she needs.”

I had no idea what to say. This seemed like a disaster in the making, but Cecilia is an adult, and she wouldn't appreciate interference. We respect certain boundaries—although
I
respect them more than she does.

“I'm sorry.” As hackneyed and pointless as that was, it was the best I could do.

“I'll ride out this Florida trip, then we'll work out details in California. She'll have the best people knocking down her door for an opportunity to work with her. She'll be fine.”

“What about you?”

He lowered his head as if his neck was too stiff to hold it. “I'm not sure what I'll do. I can retire ten times over, but I like the work. I might cut back, but I won't quit.”

“I've always felt she was...” I grasped for the right word and found it. “Safe
.
Safe with you. Once you came on the scene I stopped worrying so much.”

“What did you worry about?”

“She's so alone. Except for me it's always been Cecilia against the world.”

“That's the way she wants it.”

I rested my hand on his arm. “No, it's not. She's scared to death to have it any other way because she doesn't know how to handle anything else. You can't know what life was like for her growing up, Donny. You probably have more of a feel now, but nobody can ever fully understand.”

“Even you?”

“Not even me. And she'll never understand what
I
went through, either. For years I hardly spoke. Can you imagine Cecilia not speaking? She would have shouted louder and louder until somebody heard her. That's who she is. She always takes matters into her own hands, but this time, she's made a big mistake.”

“I just wanted you to know what's going on.”

He turned toward the house. I wondered what Cecilia was feeling right now.

In ten minutes I was back where I'd promised to be. Off to the side Mick and Donny were in conversation, and Cecilia was staring up at the second floor.

She didn't turn to greet me, but she knew I was there. “Apparently it's not as bad inside as we expected. After Betty sold the property another family moved in and probably shored up the foundation. Then the citrus growers decided not to tear down any of the buildings. They planned to use the house for administration purposes and did the bare minimum to keep it from collapsing.”

“The place is a time bomb. There aren't enough nails and manpower in the world to keep it standing much longer.”

“Termites wreaked havoc. For starters.”

“What about the new owners?”

“The land is owned by an LLC out of New York. Mick's not sure why they bought it or what they're planning, and he's only been able to communicate through their attorney.”

“God knows why they want it.”

“You have to look at it through a different lens. Not the one from 1990.” She changed the subject. “He's asked me to be the narrator, at the very least for the parts we've been involved in. Better yet the whole thing if I can carve out enough weeks in my schedule. I'm going to try.”

I'm not sure what made me probe further. “Donny thinks that's a good idea?”

“Not Donny's decision.”

“Did I mention decision? I was talking about advice. Counsel. Wisdom.”

“Apparently he's talked to you.”

“Uh-huh.” We see right through each other.

“I don't want to discuss it, okay?”

“For the record, discussing anything to do with feelings is always pretty much off the table, so I was prepared.”

Her voice wasn't quite steady. “It's a business decision. And he's right. We've been together too long and objectivity is wavering. It's better this way.”

“Right. It's all about business.”

“Let's get this over with, okay? Before I throw something at you.”

I slung my arm over her shoulder, but I squeezed. Hard. “We might be standing in front of the Osburn house, CeCe, but one thing has definitely changed.”

“Yeah?”

I squeezed even harder. “You can throw anything you want, but these days I can catch.”

43

Cecilia

The first thing that hit me when Robin and I picked our way across the porch and slipped inside the Osburn house? All hints of life have been removed. The place is now a hollow shell.

During our years here the house was shabby, with '70s geometric wallpaper peeling from the high humidity and scuffed vinyl flooring dotted with rag rugs. Now both paper and vinyl are gone, and as we moved farther inside, bare pine boards creaked under our feet and the smell of mildew grew stronger.

Betty Osburn didn't have much to work with, but in her day, the house smelled like lemons and Lysol. The cobwebs now adorning every corner were banished with a dust mop, even the ones so high she had to lean precariously over the banister and wave them into submission.

I was never sure whether to pray the banister would give way and send her tumbling to the floor or pray it wouldn't. Because as vile as Betty was, Jud was so much worse.

“The smell.” Robin coughed. “What is that?”

I outlined a list of possibilities. “Mildew, mold, dead rats in the walls, bat guano in the attic? Who knows?”

“Should we try to open the windows so the crew doesn't smother when they come inside to film?”

“Mick said they tried opening one. The sash disintegrated and the whole window crashed to the ground. Now there's a hole in the wall, and they had to board it up.”

“Imagine rain pouring in through the side of the house and not just what's left of the roof.”

I managed a perfunctory smile. “Do you remember the first time we walked through this door and stood here?”

Robin stared into space—or the past. “A week went by before I could form a sentence.”

“More like two.”

“If you hadn't been right here standing beside me, I might have been silent the rest of my childhood.”

I was warmed by that, although I was determined not to show emotion inside these walls. I pictured vampire ghosts hovering everywhere.

I gave her my version of that day. “I kept telling myself things could be worse. That if we hadn't come here we might have ended up miles apart and never been told where the other was living.”

“Jud came in behind us wheeling our suitcases.”

The suitcases were a farewell gift from the Davises. Previously both Robin and I packed our belongings in black plastic garbage bags, a foster child's best friend.

Now I could almost feel Jud creeping up behind me. I steeled myself not to look. “I think that was the last time he did anything for us, don't you?”

She didn't laugh, because, let's face it, nothing about that was funny. “Our caseworker was with us.”

“Right. Ichabod dropped us off and left. I can't remember how many times after that we actually saw him. At some point he quit his job and somebody equally disinterested took over. Remember her? At least she was honest about not wanting to do her job well.”

“What do you mean?”

“The woman who took his place. Debbie? Does that sound right?”

“Who knows?”

“Debbie said Ichabod warned her about me, so she planned to take everything I said with a grain of salt. She said I might as well not lie.”

“I don't remember that.”

Robin didn't remember because I never told her. At the time the story would have made no sense, unless I told it all.

“Where shall we go first? You spent a lot of time in the kitchen. Want to go there?”

Robin raised her camera to get a photo of the cobweb-draped stairs. “Let's get this over with and get out of here.”

The kitchen was at the end of the hall. We passed the ranch office on the left and across from it the room Betty called the parlor. A velvet love seat, perpetually protected by clear plastic, had rested against one wall until the sad day Betty discovered mice were building a nest in the cushions.

At the time the destruction seemed only fitting. Nobody but the mice ever used the parlor anyway. Having a room for company that never arrived was Betty's vision of a better life. I guess we all need our fantasies.

With a push the kitchen door creaked open. While the rest of the rooms in the house are small, in our day the country kitchen held a table for twelve. The Osburns rarely needed one that large except when Betty's extended family came at holidays, or when extra farmhands arrived to move livestock or help with the harvest. Then all the chairs were filled. At those times Robin worked in the kitchen every single moment she wasn't in school.

Now the kitchen was empty of furniture. Cupboard doors hung open; the sink was black with grime and so were the windows.

Robin trailed a fingertip along the edge of a scarred countertop, then wiped it on her jeans. “At least the food was good.”

“And as a special bonus we knew the name of every animal we ate.”

“Good thing we didn't make pets of the mustard greens or field peas, or you wouldn't eat anything these days.” She started forward, careful not to trip over the linoleum tiles curling toward the ceiling. “I helped Betty make a million meals here.”

“And gallons and gallons of sweet tea.”

“Lemonade with real lemons, remember? Coffee. The coffeepot was on all day. Jud needed lots of coffee to sober up.”

“Too bad it didn't work.”

“I don't know—when he was sober he was worse than when he was drunk.”

“Back in the day I researched that carefully. Jud was at his best when he had two beers. I used to watch and wait, and after the second, if we needed something, that was the time to ask. After three he turned mean again.”

“These days we would have a
guardian
ad litem
to talk to. The whole system is better. Caseloads are smaller. Foster parents have better screening and training. Agencies try harder to work with families before kids are removed.”

Robin sounded a little desperate, as if she needs to believe children are no longer powerless, that somebody who cares is there to listen and help. I know things are better, but I still worry about every single kid who's caught up in the system. And there will always be kids, no matter how hard caseworkers and therapists try, and how much money is allocated. Because people who should never have children and don't know how to take care of them will continue to have them, right up until Judgment Day.

Robin had wandered to the empty space where the table used to be, and I joined her.

“Betty never sat at the table,” I said. “Do you remember? She stood there.” I pointed behind her. “At the counter. Back then it was L-shaped. She stood in front of it with her plate at her side, and she ate standing up so if Jud or one of the workers needed something, she could get it.”

“She told me standing was easier than getting up and down. And when she was sick or gone for some reason, Jud made you take her place.”

I had forgotten that, but Robin was right. I hadn't been required to take Betty's place often. Unless she was on the verge of dying, she made it downstairs for meals. TLC wasn't part of Jud's philosophy.

“Why do you suppose she stayed with him?” Now Robin trailed her finger over pockmarked plaster that had once been covered by wallpaper with multiple repeats of smiling fruits and vegetables. “Didn't the ranch belong to her? Couldn't she have kicked him out and sold it? If she loved this place, she never let on.”

I knew the answer. “The property came down through her family, but Jud convinced her to title it in both their names. So if she just walked out the door, most likely he would have gotten half.”

“How on earth do you know that?”

“Jud told me once. He said...” I did my best Jud impression. “That woman knows I'll be as hard to get rid of as a bedbug. And I'll suck a whole lot of blood if she tries.”

“Please don't ever do that again. I'd almost forgotten what he sounded like.”

“Lucky you.” I peered into a cabinet, then I opened a drawer and watched something large and multilegged scurry over the back and disappear. I slammed it shut. “After he left she did sell the property. Because here we are. And she's not.”

“She's living in Connecticut.”

I spun to face her. “How do you know?”

“She sends me Christmas cards.”

That took a moment to sink it. “The Davises wrote you until they died.”

“Betty does, too.”

“You never mentioned that.”

“Did you want to know? The way you felt about her and him?”

“Why don't you tell her to stop?”

“That takes energy.”

“Why? Why would she do that?”

“Maybe she feels bad about those years. Maybe she's changed now that Jud's out of her life.”

“She says that?”

Robin started back through the doorway, the way we had come. “I don't know what she says. I can't make myself open the envelopes.”

“Really?” My voice rose a half step. “Have you ever thought maybe Jud turned up? Maybe they're together again?”

“CeCe, he deserted her twenty-five years ago. She despised him. Do you think even if he tried, she would take him back? Ever?”

“Some women will do anything to keep from being alone.”

Robin answered from the hall. “Maybe I was only fourteen when I left here for good, but I do remember he had some kind of heart condition. He was overweight, had high blood pressure. Prediabetic. While she was adding salt and butter to everything in sight Betty muttered all the things that were wrong with him, like a voodoo curse. She used to say Jud was one sparerib away from a heart attack. She never said it like she worried.”

“One more six-pack, one more pack of cigarettes, one more pound. And yet he survived it all, at least while he lived here.”

Robin's voice began to fade as she walked deeper into the house. “Do you think if he lived long enough to see you on an album cover or a television special he would have stayed in the background? Jud would have been the first one at your door with his hand out in return for a promise he wasn't going to tell stories about you.”

I followed, glad to leave the kitchen behind. “Let's go upstairs and get that over with.”

“What about the office? You spent a lot of time there.”

“We can do that on the way out.”

The stairs were rickety but safe. Treads had been replaced, but neither of us trusted the railing. The upstairs had three bedrooms. Jud and Betty slept in the middle room just in front of the stairs. Our rooms were smaller, Robin on one end, me on the other. A storeroom that was also the entrance to the attic stairs stood between her room and the master. Mine was separated from the Osburns' by the upstairs bathroom.

“Your room first,” I said.

“I hated mine. I was always scared of the dark. I wanted to share yours. Jud wouldn't let me.”

I looked away. “Something about square footage. And agency rules.”

We stood together in the doorway of the empty room that had been hers. It was only a little larger than a walk-in closet, but it had satisfied the state's requirements. Robin's bed had rested against the back wall, with a dresser under the window and a spindle leg chair to sit on. There was no room for a desk. She did homework at the kitchen table.

Now that we were upstairs the stench was worse, and the hall floor and ceiling were water stained. The roof was no longer doing its job, and the attic was hosting a mold festival.

“There was an air conditioner in the window.” Robin gestured. “Remember? If it wasn't on, you would turn it on when you came to say good-night. It rattled like a freight train, but even when it was cool outside and only the fan was blowing, the noise helped me sleep. When I moved to Live Oaks they had central air, and for months I tossed and turned because of the noises.”

I remembered making sure the old window unit was on every night, and I remembered coming in to make sure she was all right before I went to bed. Robin always had an active imagination. After we left the Davises' house she was scared of monsters, and I rescued the chair for her to prop under her doorknob to keep them away.

I didn't like thinking about that. “We shouldn't stay up here too long. Breathing this air isn't good.”

“I hated this room, but spiders didn't. It was like their clubhouse. I never got used to them. Jud liked to tease me. If I complained, he'd capture one and drop it down my shirt, just to hear me scream.”

I tried to breathe. Between the mold and fury, air wasn't seeping into my lungs. I felt dizzy and for a moment I thought I might pass out. I rested my hands on my knees and bent over.

“CeCe?”

“I'm...okay.” I took a breath, then another. “I just... I hate this place.”

“We ought to go.”

“I need to see my room. Then the office, then out.”

I straightened. Robin looked concerned, but she didn't argue. We followed the hall to the other end. She waited, and I pushed open the door. I didn't say anything. I just stared. She took several photos, not of the room but of me. A professional to her toes.

Finally she spoke. “Somebody must have had boys.”

Electric-blue walls were covered with peeling posters of football players. But the room was otherwise bare except for slime growing on the outside wall. I reached for the knob and slammed the door shut.

I was trembling. “I've seen enough.”

“I really think you should go out—”

“The office. Then out. Please.”

She was frowning, but she didn't protest.

The air downstairs almost smelled fresh in comparison. I didn't waste time. I went to the office, pushed the door wider and went in.

As hard as it was to believe, Jud's vintage desk was still exactly where it had been twenty-five years ago. Betty hadn't taken it, and the series of renters and owners who had come later hadn't disposed of it. It wasn't a valuable antique; it was scarred and battered by careless usage, but it was substantial. One side held two file drawers. The other had regular drawers once filled with office supplies.