Page 76 of If I Could Say Goodbye
‘Oh, I don’t know, it’s like our conversations are . . . censored? Like I’m trying to protect him and he’s trying to protect me so neither of us are really having a conversation at all. It’s different because now, when we see each other, we always have the kids . . . we’re never really alone any more.’
‘And Kerry?’
Kerry is red in the face as she blows up the inflatable Lilo that we took on holiday to Lanzarote.
‘Kerry is about to pass out.’ I laugh and look in her direction towards the fence where ivy weaves between the wooden slats and honeysuckle leans over from next door. Nessa follows my gaze. ‘She’s blowing up the pink Lilo that we took on holiday,’ I say, explaining.
‘When’s your brain scan?’
I blink.
Kerry has gone.
‘Next week.’
‘Have you started taking the tablets yet?’
I nod. ‘They make me feel sick.’
‘Well, there’s bound to be some side effects.’
I don’t tell her that every time I take one, they make Kerry sick too.
When we were kids, Kerry would suffer from tonsillitis; every November it would take hold of her. Her temperature would rocket; her skin would be glistening with sweat as her whole body shook. She would get delirious, the world around her becoming distorted and fictional.
A few days after I began to take the tablets, I woke in my old bed in my parents’ house with my dead sister lying next to me. Her skin grey and pallid, her body shaking; she actuallylookeddead.
‘Yes,’ I reply, ‘I suppose there are always going to be side effects.’ Killing my sister, for the second time, being one. If someone was to ask you the question of whether you could kill your sibling to stay married, to live with your own children, could you do it?
I peer over the top of my sunglasses at Nessa, who is going red across the tops of her shoulders, and offer to put some sun cream on her back. She positions the hose so it stays dropping over the edge of the pool and sits on the lounger next to me. I squirt the lotion directly onto her back.
‘That’s fucking freezing!’ she yelps. ‘Your sister was much more forgiving, she always warmed it in her hands first.’
‘Are you scared that you’ll forget the small things like that?’ I ask as my hands rub small circles of lotion onto her shoulder blades.
Nessa pulls her hair across the nape of her neck out of the way of my hands. ‘Sometimes . . . but I’m trying not to.’
‘I keep remembering things that I haven’t thought about for years, like when we were little, she would make little cardboard houses for insects. She’d spend hours decorating them. Dad would get her ripped-off pieces of wallpaper when he went to the DIY shop. Ages she would spend, creating these homes for them.’
‘Maybe we could do that with the kids?’
‘She would have liked that.’ I flick the lid shut on the bottle as Nessa lies on the sunbed, tummy down, and undoes her strap. ‘Maybe I should do more things like that – things that Kerry would have liked – instead of thinking about all the things she can’t.’
An alarm plays on my phone, reminding me that I need to take another pill. Kerry drops the Lilo and sits next to Nessa’s feet. She watches as I reach into my bag and toss the bottle between my hands. Her chin lifts in defiance: go on then, I know you have to. Her gestures mimic the time Mum caught her sneaking back into the house at half-one in the morning.
‘Did you know about this?’ Mum had asked me: hands on hips, no-messing-about expression. I’d shaken my head: not me, I know nothing.
‘Then who let her in?’
I was beaten; Kerry gave me the look and we were both grounded for two weeks.
I close my eyes behind my sunglasses and Hailey’s face hangs on the inside of my eyelids, scared and upset. My eyes flash open and I avert my gaze from Kerry, instead glancing down to the pills in my hand, throwing them to the back of my throat, hitting it like flint, scraping down my insides, cutting away at me. Their capsules separate, the insides spilling out, firing off in different directions, I can feel it . . .
Kerry coughs, covering her mouth with a tissue and bending herself forward.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say.
‘What?’ Nessa asks. Her head is turned away from me and she’s humming along to the radio. I reach down and pick up my paperback and ignore the fireworks that are exploding in my veins. The sound of the gate creaking open is quickly followed by Oscar’s voice clambering towards me; it throws its arms around my neck before his body can follow it.
