Chapter 8 - MY SISTER’S PRICE
Vivian stood in the foyer wearing the coat I had given her last Christmas.
She looked offended.
That was what nearly broke me.
Not frightened.
Not ashamed.
Offended that consequences had arrived without an appointment.
“Richard is unstable,” she said.
“You know how emotional he gets.”
I stopped halfway down the stairs.
“Did you take Clara from the picnic?”
“You need to consider what that girl wants.”
“Did you take her?”
Vivian glanced toward Arthur.
“Leave us.”
“He stays.”
Her smile disappeared.
“You always did enjoy an audience when you were being righteous.”
I walked down the last steps.
“Nineteen years.”
She folded her gloves.
“Richard wanted the child gone.”
The child.
Not Clara.
Not her niece.
“I’m asking what you did.”
“What I’ve always done.
Cleaned up everyone else’s mess.”
“By handing a four-year-old to strangers?”
“She had a home.”
“She had a home here.”
Vivian’s eyes hardened.
“And you had everything.
The house.
The husband.
The perfect little girl.
You never wondered what it was like standing next to you.”
For a moment, I saw us at sixteen and twelve.
Vivian tearing a ribbon from my hair because someone had called me pretty.
My mother making me apologize for upsetting her.
A lifetime of small cruelties I had renamed insecurity.
“Did you fake the test?”
She looked away.
That was enough.
I took out my phone.
“Say it again.”
She laughed.
“You think I’m stupid?”
“No.
I think you believed I was.”
Her phone buzzed.
She read the screen, and something changed.
She put it away too quickly.
“I can give Clara money,” she said.
“Enough to take care of Ruth.
Real money.”
“You went to Ruth’s house.”
“I sent someone to understand the situation.”
“You sent someone to find those papers.”
Vivian stepped closer.
“Ruth’s medical care is expensive.
Ask Clara how expensive.”
I slapped nothing.
Threw nothing.
I opened the front door.
“Get out.”
“This will hurt you too.”
“It already has.”
After she left, Arthur called the investigator whose number Naomi had provided.
I called Clara.
She didn’t answer.
A message arrived a minute later.
Your sister contacted me.
I typed, Don’t meet her.
Clara’s reply appeared immediately.
She says Ruth could go to prison.
May you like
Then a second message.
She sent me a copy of Mom’s signature.
