Inevitable and Only Page 6

  “We are going to read great swaths of Shakespeare this year,” he said. “So even if you don’t land a role in the play, you’ll be practicing scenes in class all semester. Thank you all for your fine work today. Go home, do your reading, we’ll start in on The Crucible tomorrow.”

  Great swaths of Shakespeare. It sounded like something Dad would say.

  And just like that, I was back in the real world. Where tonight, I would be meeting my half sister for the first time.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  By 7:45, Dad hadn’t called yet. Their train was due in at 7:15; he was supposed to call when they arrived at Penn Station, and Mom was going to pick them up.

  “Trains always run late,” Mom grumbled. She kept straightening things that didn’t need to be straightened—a Klimt print on the wall, the fifth chair we’d added to the table. It didn’t match the others, of course—it was just a folding chair.

  Mostly to distract her, I said, “Mom, I asked Farhan Mazandarani to go to the Fall Ball with me. He said yes.”

  Mom’s head swung around slowly like a brontosaurus’s. She stared at me. “Farhan Mazan … ?”

  “Yeah, you remember, the boy who snorted ice cream through a straw at my ninth birthday party?”

  Mom raised her eyebrows.

  “He’s way beyond that now, I swear.”

  “Acadia, I didn’t realize you were going to the Fall Ball.”

  “You promised I could go this year! Remember?”

  “Well, yes. But we’ll need to discuss who you’re going with, and what the driving arrangements will be, and whether you’ll—”

  Then we heard keys in the lock, the front door swung open, and there they were.

  “Hello, hello, hello!” Dad said.

  Mom started to say something, but Dad cut her off. “We splurged on a cab! Didn’t want to make you come all the way out to get us.”

  I could tell Mom was furious at being blindsided by the change in plans, at being confronted by Elizabeth’s sudden presence in the house without having time to prepare herself. At Dad, who never spent money on cabs, and who was holding a fresh bouquet of lilies, purple this time. We were probably all going to hate the scent of lilies for the rest of our lives. But Mom bustled forward and grabbed a few suitcases, set them down in the living room, then returned to give Elizabeth a hug.

  “It’s so good to meet you, dear. We’re all so happy to have you here.”

  Mom was speaking in a high-pitched, tight voice, and she always called us Spanish pet names—I’d never heard her call someone “dear” before. Unless maybe you counted the fawn at the Maryland State Fair petting zoo, which was, objectively, a deer.

  Elizabeth, standing on the welcome mat, smiled hesitantly at us. “I’ve heard a lot about you.” She was pale and had dark circles under her eyes, but she had done her best to cover it up with a tasteful amount of makeup.

  I tried to take her in at a quick glance without staring. She was picking nervously at the sleeve of her navy blue cardigan, half-buttoned over a white blouse. Her whole outfit, down to the argyle socks and brown loafers, said 100% Genuine Prep School. She even had pearls in her earlobes and a delicate gold necklace. And she did not appear to be wearing any of those items ironically.

  And she was so … white. My fears from the night before had come true. Elizabeth had strawberry-blond hair, like Dad’s and Josh’s but a lot longer. With Dad’s freckles, too. Just like I’d imagined.

  I realized I’d failed at the whole not-staring thing.

  I snuck a peek at Dad, standing behind Elizabeth with his hands on her shoulders. But he wasn’t looking down at her, or even at Mom. He was looking straight at me. He had a too-wide smile pasted on, but his eyes were searching. I could almost hear him thinking at me: Cadie, please be nice. Be friendly. Be welcoming. Be my Cadiest.

  I thought back at him: Nice and welcoming to your secret other daughter? Who looks just like you? Who you’ve probably already given a nickname to on your long bonding train ride? Who looks completely perfect and I don’t even know her yet but I already hate her?

  “Dinner’s almost ready,” said Mom crisply, interrupting my internal dialogue. Dad gave her a questioning look. “And by dinner, I mean takeout. I’m so sorry, Elizabeth, Ross is really the cook in this house. I didn’t want your first meal here to be one of my sad attempts. But our local Thai restaurant is excellent.”

  “Takeout’s fine,” Elizabeth said politely.

  “Great!” Mom beamed. “I’ll just run out and pick it up, then. No sense in paying extra for delivery, the place is just around the corner.” She couldn’t have moved toward the door more quickly if the snapping hounds of hell had been at her heels. Elizabeth leaped out of her way, and Dad laughed. His laugh sounded like a word we didn’t know in some other language. We all turned and looked at him.

  “Cadie,” he said, in Jovial Suggestion Voice, “why don’t you help Elizabeth move her things upstairs? You can give her a tour of the house while we’re waiting for Mom.”

  And so I trudged upstairs with a duffel bag over each arm and showed Elizabeth the room we were going to share, now complete with a new twin bed against the far wall. My old bed was under one of the windows. I had to admit that that was one advantage of this bedroom—the two big windows that looked out over the street.

  The duffel bags weighed a ton. “Did you bring rocks or something?” I said, dropping them on the floor with a thump. The words sounded much ruder than I’d meant them to be, as soon as they were out of my mouth. I bit my lip.

  “No, those are books,” she said, as if I’d asked nicely. “And—there are a few more downstairs.”

  Hmm. Good thing we had an extra bookshelf we could bring up from the basement.

  Elizabeth complimented everything: Micayla’s paintings on the walls, the rag rug, the patchwork quilts on the beds. But she had a wide-eyed rabbit look on her face the whole time, as if she was still considering whether or not to bolt. I showed her my old room, which was completely filled by the queen bed, with about two feet of space around the edges. I didn’t tell her that my parents had given up their room for us, but I think she figured it out.

  When I showed her Josh’s room, with his cello and music stand set up in the corner, she said, “I’m looking forward to hearing your brother play. Ross told me how good he is.”

  Ross? At least she wasn’t going to call him Dad, or at least not right away. That would make things feel even weirder. I wondered what she’d call Mom. Then I remembered that she didn’t have a mom anymore, and I felt bad for feeling good about the Ross/Dad thing. Sheesh.

  “I guess Josh is your brother, too,” I mumbled, and she shot me a startled look.

  “Oh. Um. I guess he is.”

  The rest of the tour didn’t take long. I showed her the half-finished basement, filled with our old couch and a mishmash of boxes and other random items like a baby stroller, a gigantic doll-house, and an exercise bike Dad had found at the Goodwill and used exactly once, before it occurred to him that he already had a real bike that he enjoyed using to actually ride places.

  I showed her the back deck and our tiny backyard, with its one tree and view of the alley. “Stray cat central,” I said. “Don’t get any ideas, though. My mom won’t allow anything that would shed in the house.”

  Elizabeth nodded. “I’ve never had a pet, either.”

  “Oh, we’ve had plenty of pets. Fish, mostly, but once we had a snake. It was supposed to be Josh’s snake but he was terrified of it, so I took care of it. It was a she. Rosie. She was really sweet.” I was doing my babbling thing again, like I’d done with Farhan that afternoon. I pressed my lips together and noticed Elizabeth was staring at me in alarm.

  “You don’t still have the snake, do you?”

  Oh, for crying out loud. “No, she died years ago. I don’t think it’s very good for snakes to keep them in little tanks.”

  Elizabeth let out a sigh of relief. “That’s too bad. I’m terrified of snakes
, too, though. Just like your little brother.”

  I could tell she was trying to make me smile, so I refrained from reminding her again that he was her little brother, too. After all, I wasn’t going to force her to share anything about my family if she didn’t want to.

  “Girls!” Mom called. “Food’s here!”

  And that’s when the Great Shocker happened.

  We were sitting around the table, passing out cardboard boxes and chopsticks, the lilies staring at us from the kitchen counter because there wasn’t room on the table. I’d gotten stuck with the folding chair. Mom said, “Does everyone have what they want? There’s some more orange bean curd over here,” and Dad said, “I’ve got the tofu pad Thai.” (I noticed Mom had ordered a separate pad Thai with beef, for Elizabeth.) We all filled our plates. Elizabeth hesitated, so Dad said, “Well, let’s dig in!”

  But she kept fiddling with the charm on her necklace. “Do you—I’d like to, if you don’t mind—we usually say grace before we eat.” We? She seemed to catch her usage of the plural pronoun at the same time, and bit her lip. And then I realized what the tiny necklace charm was. It was a gold crucifix.

  Dad and Mom, for the first time in a week, looked like a team again—because they had the exact same stunned look on their faces, as if Elizabeth had just told them she was pregnant. Or the proud owner of a unicorn. Or pregnant with a unicorn.

  “We’re Jewish,” Mom offered. As if this somehow answered Elizabeth’s implied question.

  “Jew-ish,” Dad clarified. “You know, the atheist kind. We don’t do synagogue or any of that stuff, we don’t believe in God. But we sure are glad She created latkes and hamantaschen.” He grinned, but Elizabeth just stared at him.

  I used to be embarrassed about trying to explain this to teachers who pointedly wished me “Happy Hanukkah” while doling out red-and-green plates and napkins at Christmas parties, or to friends who wanted to know in eighth grade why I was the only Jewish kid at school who wasn’t having a bat mitzvah.

  Mom was still gazing at Elizabeth like they used to stare at me, and suddenly I wanted to put my hand under her chin and snap her mouth shut.

  “Of course we can say grace,” I said, grabbing Josh’s hand on my right and Mom’s on my left. “Elizabeth, would you like to lead us off?”

  The only time I remember ever saying grace was at Ahimsa House, where we used to join hands before meals sometimes and sing, while a man named Dancer played along on his guitar. But Elizabeth didn’t sing. She bowed her head, clasping her hands together under her chin.

  “Bless us, O Lord, and these your gifts, which we are about to receive from your bounty. Through Christ, our Lord. Amen.”

  Dad and I had bowed our heads, too, but out of the corner of my eye I saw Josh, his brow furrowed, looking around the table as if he wasn’t sure who these people were. And Mom was staring at Elizabeth as if she’d sprouted horns. Or angel wings.

  “Amen!” I said loudly, releasing Mom’s and Josh’s hands, and picked up my chopsticks. “And l’chaim, and all that,” I added, trying to break the tension.

  Dad reached across the table and patted Elizabeth’s hand. “That was lovely, just lovely. We’re excited to learn more about your traditions, sweetie. L’chaim indeed!”

  Mom smiled weakly and echoed, “L’chaim.” Then she left the table to pour herself a glass of wine.

  That night, as we lay in our separate beds, I tried to figure out what to say. I couldn’t ask her about her mother, of course. And I didn’t think she’d want to talk about her school, her friends, her old life in Ohio. “So,” I said, “do you go by Liz? Lizzie? Beth?”

  “No, just Elizabeth.”

  There was an awkward silence.

  When Josh had gone up to his room to practice after dinner, Elizabeth had asked if she could come and listen. Josh brought his cello downstairs instead, and Elizabeth and Dad sat on the couch together and listened for an hour or so while Mom and I worked—homework for me and paperwork for her—at the kitchen table. Do you think she goes to church, too? Mom had whispered. Probably, I whispered back, and Mom grimaced. We have to make her feel at home, I hissed, angry that I was being forced to pick sides between Mom and Elizabeth here. I didn’t want to be on either of their sides. I wanted to be back on Dad’s side. The old Dad, the one who had two children, Acadia Rose and Joshua Tree, the Dad who—

  “Do you play any instruments?” Elizabeth asked, saving me from spiraling further into that memory.

  “I used to. I played the violin. But I wasn’t anywhere near as good as Josh, so I quit.” I sighed. “What about you?”

  “Clarinet. I play in the band—I mean, if there’s a band at your school?”

  “Yeah. We have a few bands. Jazz band, marching band, wind ensemble.” Elizabeth didn’t respond, so I tried to think of something else to say. “Um, our school is very big on the arts.”

  There was a soft knock on our door.

  “Girls? Can I come in?” It was Dad.

  He flicked on the light and took a few steps into our room, hesitated, then sat down on the edge of Elizabeth’s bed.

  Not mine.

  “Just wanted to say good night,” he said softly. “To my two girls.” He paused, but neither of us said anything, so he kept going. “I know this is a lot of changes all at once, and maybe you haven’t even processed everything you’re going through right now. But Elizabeth, I want you to know that we’re all here for you. Whatever you need. We are your family, and we love you. How are you doing so far?”

  I noticed how many times he said we again. Putting words in my mouth, speaking for me, without even asking me how I was doing.

  “I’m okay, thanks,” she said, just as quietly. I started to feel like I was eavesdropping on a private conversation in my own room, for the love of God. (I mean, for the love of Zeus and Hera and all their children. I’d have to learn how to stop taking God’s name in vain around Elizabeth.)

  “Okay?” Dad repeated. “Well, I guess that’s better than ‘not okay.’ But it’s also okay if you’re not okay—okay?”

  I could tell he was trying to get her to laugh, and maybe she smiled, but I’d already rolled over to stare at the wall.

  Elizabeth’s bed creaked as Dad stood up, and then I felt my mattress sink as he sat on the edge of my bed. He squeezed my feet. “You too, Cadie. How are you feeling? Do you want to talk?”

  I closed my eyes. “Can you just let me go to sleep?”

  Dad let go of my feet, and my words hung in the air for a tense moment. Then he whispered, “Of course,” and got up to turn out the light.

  After Dad left, neither of us spoke again. I stared at the ceiling for what felt like hours, my stomach twisted in knots, watching shadows from the streetlight playing across the ceiling. I wondered if Elizabeth was already asleep, but after a while I heard soft sniffling coming from her side of the room.

  If I were spending my first night in a new house, with a new family, less than a week after my mom died, I’m sure I’d cry, too—except I didn’t do crying if I could possibly help it. And when I did, I usually wanted people to pretend it wasn’t happening. So I rolled over and convinced myself I hadn’t heard anything. But the moonlight was brighter on this side of the house than I was used to, and it took me a long time to fall asleep.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Mom and Dad had suggested that Elizabeth take a week or so to “adjust to her new situation” before starting school. Mom offered (somewhat feebly, I thought) a back-to-school shopping trip, and Dad said he’d take her down to DC to see the sights—the White House and all the monuments, the Smithsonian Institution, the National Zoo, the Kennedy Center. But Elizabeth had declined (politely, of course), saying that she didn’t want to have to worry about making up schoolwork. I could tell Mom was relieved, but Dad seemed disappointed.

  So the next morning, we all squeezed into the Honda and rode to school together—Dad, too. He’d insisted on leaving the bookshop in Cassandra’s capable paws
for a few hours in order to come help Elizabeth “get settled at school.” There really wasn’t much for him to do. As soon as we got there, Elizabeth went to the front office with Mom and handed in all her paperwork. Then they gave her a locker assignment and a class schedule and turned her loose. Mom said, “Well, that’s that, I’ve got a meeting in four minutes, you know where to find me if you need me, oh and Cadie, don’t forget Josh has a double lesson today after school,” and disappeared into her office. But Dad hovered, reminding me again to show Elizabeth the ropes and help her find her classrooms.

  “Dad. I know,” I said. “You don’t need to stick around. She’s going to be fine.”

  Dad hesitated, then held out his arms. I saw the relief that softened his face when Elizabeth stepped forward for a hug. “If you need anything at all, you have my cell number,” he murmured into her ear, and she nodded. The hug went on long enough that I started to feel awkward standing there, so I pretended to look through my school bag for something.

  “Dad,” I said. “We’re going to be late.”

  “Right,” he said, and made a motion as if reaching to pull me into the hug too, but I ignored him.

  Dad sighed. He let go of Elizabeth and stood there, looking from one of us to the other and back again. He smiled. “My girls. You really do look like sisters.” I stared at him. What was he seeing? Elizabeth and I looked nothing alike. We were nothing alike.

  He turned twice to wave at us as he walked down the hall. I didn’t wave back.

  Elizabeth clutched her schedule and shifted her bag to her other arm. She didn’t carry a backpack—she’d piled all her notebooks into a beige L.L.Bean tote bag. It looked much more chic than my ratty orange backpack, which had song lyrics scribbled all over it in multicolored Sharpie markers.

  The tote bag had a monogram: E.M.J. I snuck a peek at the top of her schedule. Elizabeth Marie Jennings. So she had her mother’s last name. At least we didn’t have to share a name, too.