Page 147 of Love Notes & Lifelines
Stella reaches for the folder, and after a brief tug-of-war, I relinquish it and watch as she stashes it in the cabinet under the sink. She protects it because it’s important to me.
“Tell me,” she says while reaching for the bottom of my T-shirt and pulling it over my head.
I allow it. I allow her to take care of me while I work through memories that bring both pain and joy.
“The third floor was Cally’s room when I was really little, but she always let me in. She wasn’t one of those big sisters who got annoyed by her younger sibling. She took care of me as though I were hers. I think I started sleeping on her floor as soon as I was old enough to crawl out of my crib. That’s why there’s bean bags up there.”
Emotion collects on Stella’s lashes, but she blinks it away and unbuttons my jeans, then removes them and my boxers in one fell swoop. I stand, immobile, allowing her to care for me while I unearth memories I’ve repressed.
She turns on the shower, then removes her clothes. I scan her naked form, and my body responds. I can’t help it, butthis isn’t about sex. This is about knowing our connection, our relationship that started out with so many rocky shores, will weather whatever storm comes our way.
She tests the water, then ushers me inside. She follows and closes the glass door behind her. It’s a tight fit because this shower is only meant for one person, but she maneuvers around me with ease and applies soap to my body while silently prodding me to continue.
“When I was in first or second grade, she’d gone to a friend’s house for a sleepover. My dad was upset about something. It was the first time I’d heard him yell like that when she wasn’t here, and I got scared, so I ran to Cally’s room.”
Stella places a gentle kiss on my chest, then turns me toward the spray of hot water and washes my back.
“I wasn’t allowed to touch the skylights. That was a rule. One of the only rules I ever remember having, but it was cloudy, and I couldn’t find the stars Cally had taught me to count when I was scared. There are a lot of windows, they take up most of the ceiling, but I couldn’t find even one star. I thought if I opened the skylights, I’d be able to see them. I got up on my tiptoes and pushed with my fingertips until the heavy lever lifted.”
She turns me again and drops to her knees to wash my legs.
“I think I got scared a lot back then, but that night I woke up in the middle of a raging storm and couldn’t reach the handle, so I ran to my room to hide. I thought if I couldn’t see it, it wouldn’t be as bad.”
Her eyes are damp, and I know it’s not from the shower as she stares up at me through long lashes.
“Cally was gone all weekend. And it rained harder than I’ve ever seen. My dad was in a terrible mood. He yelled, my mother cried, and I was too scared to tell anyone. By the time Cally got home, there was so much damage to not only the room, but the roof, the floor, even the ceiling on the second floor.”
I reach down to pull Stella from her knees. I can’t look down at her while I recall the next part.
“I remember my father yelling, and Cally saying she didn’t do it while she attempted to salvage all her books and I hid under my bed. Eventually, she realized it was me and took the blame.”
I can’t swallow past the lump in my throat, so I lift my chin to the ceiling. “She had to work for free for four summers at Hayes & Delacroix to pay for the damage, and my father had the observatory sealed off during construction as punishment. A piece of Cally died that day. Looking back now, I know she shielded me from a lot.”
I shake my head. “She tried to shield me from it all. I grew up thinking I had the perfect childhood because she took my father’s angry words, my mother’s depression and detached parenting, and absorbed them before they ever reached me.”
So many memories shift in my mind as I recall them as they were and not as she framed them. The fights my parents had over money and the business. The empty bottles of liquor that I helped Cally carry out of the house. Even when I was old enough to know better, I believed her excuse about cooking wine.
“I believed it all because I wanted to. I grew up in a land of make-believe while she grew up in a house of horrors.”
“No.” Stella’s stern voice has me snapping my attention toward her. “You grew up believing in the good of your family because that’s a choice Cally made. Obviously, she wanted happiness for you, and she sacrificed so you could have it. Don’t diminish the fact that it was a choice, and one that probably brought her a great deal of peace she didn’t otherwise have.”
Rose-colored glasses. How can this woman still see the light when she’s been shrouded in darkness her entire life?
She inches me out of the way to rinse her body, then turns off the shower and exits the stall. Her moves are efficient but graceful as she dries herself, then pulls down a giant robe fromthe hook on the door and puts it on. She hands me a towel and leaves the room. By the time I’m dry, she’s returned with fresh clothing for us both.
“The girls are having a good time with all the attention they’re receiving down there, so let’s get dressed and see what Cally left you, okay? Then we’ll make a plan.”
She doesn’t give me a chance to agree, she just drops her robe and steps into a pair of panties, then tugs on navy blue leggings, a bra, and one of my sweatshirts. She’s dressed before I’ve even removed the towel and stands there with a toe tapping against the floorboards, her arms crossed over her chest.
It makes me smile. Correction, she makes me smile. Even as my life as I knew it is crumbling around me, I know we’ll rise from the ashes to build something bigger and better than I could have ever dreamed.
So I do as she requested. I dress, grab the folder that burns my skin, and follow her into my sister’s old room.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
STELLA
Beck sitson the floor with his back to the bookcase as I lay out all of Cally’s documentation in chronological order.
