First Thrills - Lee Child [127]
Now that I’m grown, away from Mama’s house, away from Carol Ann, I remember the little things. Spilling on Carol Ann’s bike, scraping the length of my thigh on the gravel. The year she pushed me into the cactus while we were trick-or-treating. The day I nearly drowned when I fell through the ice on Gideon’s Lake, and she laughed watching me panic before she went for help. Carol Ann did nothing but get me in trouble, and I was happy to leave her behind as an adult.
So you can imagine my shock and surprise when the doorbell rang, late one evening, and Carol Ann was on my front step. Somewhere, deep inside me, I knew something was dreadfully wrong.
I live in the A-frame house I grew up in. Mama’s been in a home over in Spring Hill for a couple of years now. They have nice flowerbeds, and I visit her often. We walk amongst the flowers and she reminds me of all the terrible things I did when I was a kid. No one thought I’d ever grow out of my awkward stage, but I did. I went off to college and everything. Carol Ann went to a neighboring school. I’d see her every once in a while, working as a waitress in one of the coffee shops on campus, or shopping in the bookstore. I learned that it was best to ignore her. If I ignored her enough, she’d get the hint and leave.
But here she was, in the flesh, rain streaming down her face. Her blond hair was shorter, wet through, darker than I remembered. She was a skinny thing, not the radiant beauty I remember from my childhood.
I was frozen at the door, unsure of what to do. She knew better than to come calling; that was strictly forbidden. We’d laid down those ground rules years before, and she’d always listened. I was saved by the phone ringing. I glared at her and motioned for her to stay right where she was. Carol Ann was not invited into my house. Not after what she did all those years ago. It had taken me forever to get over that.
The phone kept trilling, so I turned and went to the marble side table in the foyer, the one that held the old fashioned rotary dial. I picked it up, almost carelessly. It was Mama’s nurse at the Home. I listened. Felt the floor rushing up to meet me. Everything went dark after that.
When I woke, the sun was streaming in the kitchen window. Somehow I’d gotten myself to a chair. There was coffee brewing, the rich scent wafting to my nose. Carol Ann stood at the counter, a yellow cup in her hands. She took a deep drink, then smiled at me.
“Hey, stranger.” Her voice was soft, that semi-foreign lilt more pronounced, like she’d been living overseas lately.
“Hey, yourself,” I replied. “You’re not supposed to be here.”
“You needed me.” She’d shrugged, a lock of lank blond falling across her forehead. “I’m sorry about your Mama. She was a good woman.”
I had a vision of Mama then, standing in the same spot, her hair in curlers, rushing to finish the preparations for a garden-club meeting, stopping to lean back and take a sip of hot, sweet tea and smiling to herself because it was perfect. She was perfect. Mama was always perfection personified. Not flawed and messy like me. My heart hurt.
I forced myself to do the right thing. To do what needed to be done. My heart broke a little, and my head swam when I said, “Carol Ann, you need to leave. I don’t need you. I never did.”
She looked down at the floor, then met my eyes. Tear glistened in the corners, making the cornflower blue look like a wax crayon. “C’mon, Lily. We’re blood sisters, you and I. We’re a physical part of each other. How can you say you don’t need a part of yourself? The best part of yourself? I make you strong.”
“No!” I screamed at her, all patience gone. “You are not a part of me. You aren’t . . .”
A fury I hadn’t felt in years bubbled through my chest. There was only one way to get through to her. I grabbed the porcelain mug from her hand, smashed it on the counter, and swiped a gleaming shard across her perfect white throat. She fell in a heap, blood everywhere.
As I stood over her, watching her hair turn strawberry, I felt a tug and looked down at my leg.