The Last Hour (Thompson Sisters), Sheehan-Miles, Charles [reading an ebook .txt] 📗

my head. “No. I don’t know why, but somehow all of this fits. I’m worried about you because of what’s going on with Jessica. I’m worried because the one thing Julia and I tried to do was ... protect you guys. For the times when we didn’t have anyone else. I’m worried that you’re shutting your sister out. And honestly I’m worried about Andrea too ... I knew she was spending a lot of time with Grandmother, but ... why won’t she come home?”

Sarah looked away and swallowed. “I know we were all about protecting each other. You ... you were like our mom, Carrie. But we’re not seven anymore.”

I put my hand on her shoulder and said, “I know that, Sarah. That’s why it matters so much! Who are you going to be able to talk to if you can’t talk with your twin? Or if she can’t come to you?”

Sarah shook her head and said, “That’s just the thing. She can’t come to me. Or thinks she can’t.”

“I don’t understand.”

She leaned close and said, “Carrie, she ... I know she looks all pretty and dresses like Mother ... but she’s deep. She keeps secrets. I’ve got no idea what’s going on with her. None.”

She looked up at the wall, away from me, and said, “It kinda hurts, you know? Jessica’s got this whole life separate from me. And she never said a word. It happened so fast. When we started school junior year? She hadn’t said anything to me, or to Mother, or anyone. She just went in and very quietly requested to have her entire schedule changed, so we didn’t have any classes together.”

Confusion clouded through me. This wasn’t at all what I’d been expecting. “I don’t understand,” I said.

“I don’t either. I mean ... I may be a little obnoxious. I may be a little in your face. But ... I’d never deliberately hurt her.”

Oh, wow. Sarah’s face was scrunched up, the tiny muscles around her eyes trembling. She was fighting to suppress tears. And not doing a very good job of it. And the thing was, I could see it. It had been a long time since I’d lived here, but I came often for the holidays, and sometimes weeks at a time in the summer. And Jessica had always been ... perfectly polite. Polished. Prim. But it was as much a front as Sarah’s black eyeliner and combat boots. It was like they were both pushing away, trying to make themselves into something different from each other, but in opposite ways.

We all noticed it with Sarah. Because her behavior was so outlandish for our uptight, difficult family. But that didn’t mean Jessica wasn’t struggling just as much. I wondered if she felt invisible. What must that be like?

For the first time in a long time, I was genuinely unhappy I didn’t live at home any more. Never mind that it had been ten years. Never mind that I had a life and a career of my own. More than anything else, right then and there, I wanted to be there for my sisters.

Of course, that wasn’t to be. We were split all over the place now. Julia, wandering the world on her tours and living in Boston in between them. Alexandra engaged, loving New York City. I’d be moving to Bethesda, Maryland just outside of Washington, in a few more days, which meant three out of the six of us were now spread along the east coast. All signs pointed to Andrea not coming home at all before she finished high school.

That was it, I thought. In summer, unless disaster intervened, I was going to Spain. Maybe Ray could come with me, but if not, I was still going. I needed to see Andrea. I needed to let her know that I was still her big sister, and that I’d always, always be there for her if she needed me.

The rest of Christmas was quiet. Sarah and Jessica made up for the time being, and came downstairs to open presents. My mother gave them dresses cut on the same pattern, but in a supreme fit of irony, gave a black one to Jessica and a white one to Sarah. I wondered if they would secretly trade. Or Sarah just might take a Sharpie to hers. Which would be a shame, because it was a beautiful dress and looked to have cost upwards of eight hundred dollars.

We all called Julia, Alexandra, and then Andrea, and passed the phone around and spoke with them one by one. Then, breaking tradition, the five of us left the house and went out for Chinese food for dinner. Maybe it was a chance for some new traditions. I would grant my mother this: she was trying. She was taking her meds, and I hadn’t heard her say anything truly spiteful in a long time. My father was the same as always—distant and a little overwhelmed. And so another Christmas passed, and two days later I boarded a flight for New York.

Tell the Army I said hi! (Carrie)

Tell the Army I said hi! (Carrie)

The plane touched the ground with a bump and screech of tires, and I felt the force of the sudden deceleration as the engines reversed. I closed my book as we taxied across the airport. For the first time since I’d left my parents’ townhouse that morning, I felt tension, just a slight twist in my stomach. I was excited to see Ray, but nervous too. He’d sounded so stressed when we spoke on the phone last night. Stressed and exhausted. He’d spent another day being questioned by the Army. It was beyond excessive. How many different ways could he tell the same story?

I wanted badly by the end of that phone call to hug him so tightly that all of the tension would just drain out. And that’s exactly what I was going to do the moment I met him at the security gate.

I