14. SISTER, SISTER

SISTER, SISTER

" I should probably shower." I rubbed my eyes. "The girls will know something's wrong." Jess swiveled to look at me, to take inventory of the damage, and I could imagine what she saw: wavy hair in frizzy tendrils around my pale olive face, not in a "messy but hot" way, but in a "my head was nearly pulled from my body by a psychopath" way. My face felt sticky, and I could sense where my mascara had left crusted black saltwater trails down my cheeks.

I shifted uncomfortably on my oak bar stool where Jess and I had been hunched over the white marble counter in my "light and airy" kitchen for a while. At least, that's what Sebastian had called it when he designed it. When they did the renovation, I'd repeatedly said that I wanted a home that felt "awake" and "alive," but after what happened the night before, after a giant man forced his way into my home, the rising sun and its warmth pouring in through the windows could only remind me that I had way too many fucking windows. Each one a possible entry point.

"Maybe you could just say we had a slumber party and stayed up all night binge-watching sad nineties movies and hysterically sobbing. They'd probably buy that. Tell them you watched The Notebook and One Day back-to-back." "Jesus Christ! I look that bad?"

"Yeah, you fucking do."

Jess had been in a fitful sleep when I'd called her at two a.m. after the police had left. When she heard the quiver in my voice followed by a breakdown into a dark, unnatural pitch on the phone, she must have sprinted for her car, plaid pajama set, fuzzy boots, and all, because she pulled up less than fifteen minutes later, pale-faced and shaking. This is where we'd been for a while now, hunched over our coffee cups, shoulders touching, the house still and ominous, even as the sun came up over the horizon.

Jess gently patted my knee.

"Do you want to get a little sleep, sis? It's five, and I can watch the girls when they get up."

"I can't. I'm too anxious to sleep. I keep replaying the night over and over again. I keep imagining a million different horrifying scenarios."

"Yeah, of course, someone just broke into your house and attacked you."

"Like dad." My voice nearly broke, "I almost ended up like dad."

Jess's hand went still on my leg, heavy, and the light in her eyes dimmed just a little at that. She tried to hide it, but I noticed the deep, shaky breath she took. She cleared her throat, and her hand began moving on my knee again.

"Did the police have any more info on what happened and why? Or were they just totally useless?"

"No," I croaked, "just what I told you, that there have been a lot of break-ins around here recently and that man probably thought the house was empty."

I started to rock slowly back and forth to soothe my electric nerves.

"They said he probably saw Steven leave with bags. He panicked when he realized I was in the house. That's probably why he attacked me. But how the fuck do they know? Maybe he's a murderer. Maybe the guy had lead poisoning. I read that lead poisoning leads to aggression. But then, so does poverty. Maybe he's struggling to pay bills. Maybe he injured his back skiing and is now addicted to heroin. Maybe our family is cursed, and he was here for me, intentionally. Who the fuck knows." My eyes darted around, brows knit together. "And Andras, my neighbor. The one I told you about before? It was weird enough that he just showed up and saved me and then literally disappeared. But I could have sworn that something flashed in his eyes when he got close to the man, when he leaned over to look at him. Almost like fear and recognition. But maybe I'm going crazy and imagining it. Maybe he was never even here at all."

"You're not going crazy. You're traumatized, and I'm sure it's triggering as fuck given all of the stuff we've already put behind us. But yeah, him just taking off, that's weird. That's "wanted by the FBI" weird,"' Jess agreed. "But it's not that strange that he came to help. You said he walks by all the time. It's definitely possible that he just heard struggling and came to help and left…honestly…who knows? Maybe he's a drug mule."

I frowned. She grinned in an attempt to lighten the mood, to ease the anxiety.

"I'm super grateful for him, but I don't know, something was off. He came running in like one of the X-Men with super Hulk strength and—"

"Hulk isn't one of the X-Men, sis."

I glared at that.

"I mean, it makes sense that you don't feel extremely trusting right now. But you don't know his background, right? Maybe he was in the Marines? Or maybe he's a retired MMA fighter. Or maybe he did that weird, ole-timey sword-fighting bullshit you did when you were a kid, and he's really into gallantry, or what the fuck ever? Maybe he's on steroids."

"It's called fencing, asshole . And Dad made me do it, along with the decade of martial arts he forced on both of us. And I don't know. It was more than the crazy strength. He looked off, somehow. His pupils were all giant and black."

"He probably did too much cocaine at the club."

I ignored her attempt at levity this time. My eyes flicked up towards the ceiling and stayed there as I left my body for a moment, the details of the night playing out. The fear and anger still lingering in my body seemed to anchor themselves deep in my flesh; I could feel myself being branded by the experience in real time. I shook my head, trying to dispel the images.

I scrubbed at my face and turned to Jess.

"I don't feel safe. I feel like my seams are going to break. I can't take any more right now." I rubbed my hands through my hair and let out a growl of frustration. A strange pressure expanded in my chest, an electrical storm about to burst. As if any minute, a thread would rip, and the nervous, chaotic energy that made up my insides was going to erupt from me and destroy the world.

Jess rested a slender hand between my shoulder blades. A warm smile appeared on her face as if to say, "I'm here. It's going to be okay, I promise." I tried to return the look, but my lips turned up weakly, my eyes too full of exhaustion to sell it.

"Well, that's a terrifying sort of expression," Jess said, chuckling softly. "I'm here, okay. And I'm not leaving until you kick me out of your goddamn house."

"Thank you."

I knew all of this was hard for her, too, knew it brought up memories of our father and that she wouldn't leave because she loved me but also because she feared that someone else she loved might be ripped from her if she wasn't diligent and present. It was the same way I felt day after day after we lost our dad, like every moment was fragile and like everyone I loved could be ripped away. I fell forward to rest my forehead on my arms on the counter.

"I need to text Steven," I groaned. "He's in New York or something."

"I'll do it," Jess said, picking up her phone and quickly typing out a message to Steven. She read it out loud, summarizing the events of the night, followed by a terse, "Everyone is okay and safe."

My voice was surprisingly raspy as I said into the counter, "as soon as they wake up, let's just get out of here. Let's go get a vat of fucking coffee and just get out of this house."

"Okay, just rest. I'll watch the monitor and keep the girls safe." I heard her pull the little screen over to her, heard the stool shift as she leaned back, getting comfortable for the long haul. Jess sighed and whispered, "I seriously need to get me one of those sleep machines. They're fucking magic if even Liv slept through it all."

A horrible buzzing sound coming from somewhere nearby jolted me awake. It felt like my skull was being compressed like a sponge being wrung out by two meaty hands. My eyes flew open and my neck and cheek stung as I peeled my face from the counter. "Oh Jesus," I said, rubbing my skin where an angry pink mark had formed. I looked around my sunny kitchen, bewildered, my mind in the thick fog of exhaustion. Then it all came flooding back to me, the break-in, the man, all of it.

The room spun. My hand gripped the counter to steady myself while I listened for my sister. The buzzing came from my phone vibrating against an empty coffee mug on the counter.

"Hello?" I answered nervously.

"Danny, what's going on?" Steven demanded, panicked, his voice scratchy and higher than usual. "I got a text from Jess saying that someone broke into our house a few hours ago and I haven't heard anything from either of you! And she's not answering her fucking phone. Are the girls okay? Danny? Danny! Are you there?"

"The girls," I scanned the kitchen for the monitor, but it wasn't there. I walked into the living room. Empty. My stomach twisted, and I sprinted towards the staircase.

"Danny?" Steven yelled into the phone.

"Hold on!" I snapped back.

"Jess? Are you up there?" I called up the staircase. No response, no footsteps, no movement.

I climbed the stairs, three steps at a time, and just as I nearly reached the second floor, I heard a faint giggling coming from out back. I scrambled to my feet and ran towards the back door, bursting through the screen, my cell phone still in my hand and Steven's voice, small and far away, calling out to me. In the backyard, Olivia and Victoria were zipping around, squealing, while Jess growled in hot pursuit.

"Girls!" I called out, louder and more shrill than I meant to. Olivia and Victoria's heads craned around to see me frazzled and wide-eyed with a red welt the size of an orange in the middle of my forehead from the nap, like a psychotic narwhal.

"Mamma's awake!" Olivia announced, clapping and jumping up and down. Both girls ran towards me and each one tackled a leg, hugging and yanking my kneecaps in an adorably painful show of love.

"Hi, my loves," I sang, reaching down to run my hands over their soft, messy tendrils. My shoulders relaxed with every passing second that I could see that they were safe and secure right in front of me.

Jess wandered over, "You're up! How was your nap? Who is this on the phone?" She poked the screen in my hand that was just kind of dangling at my fingertips.

"Oh shit!" I said, holding my phone back up to my ear, "Steven? Are you there?."

He was gone, so I slid my phone back into my pocket and reached down to grab Victoria, who was sitting on my foot, wrapping herself around my leg.

"Come here, darling," I said, heaving just a little as I picked her up for a big hug, nuzzling my face against her tiny neck. Victoria giggled.

Jess bounced around the yard like an airplane, holding a cackling Olivia in her arms. Olivia zoomed off the moment her feet hit the ground as if some motor inside of her kept her legs going at all times.

Jess tilted her head, pressing her lips together. "You okay, sis?" She asked.

I kissed Victoria on the head before setting her down.

"Yeah, I just woke up in a bit of a panic because as soon as I opened my eyes, everything flooded back to me, and I couldn't find you. And then Steven called. I guess he's coming home as soon as he can grab a flight. How terrible is it that I'm actually surprised he's coming home for this?"

"That's pretty fucking depressing, is what that is." Jess's wide eyes were trained on mine. Then her face relaxed and she blew a raspberry to break the tension. "How are you feeling? Do you want to see the cameras I had installed while you were zonked out?"

"Cameras? How?"

"I know a guy!" Jess said, huffing a laugh.

Jess grabbed my hand and led me around to the side of the house. There were four cameras that captured every imaginable angle. Even one pointing to the sky. "Is that in case someone tries to parachute out of a plane onto our roof?" I joked. Jess nodded her head and we exchanged a smile before she grabbed my hand and led me to the other side of the house to see the other nine-hundred cameras.

Jess showed up for people by getting shit done, and there was absolutely no one better. She had a knack for knowing when and how to take charge like she could see inside of people, partly because she was genuinely fascinated with folks and could sit for hours listening to anyone go on about anything and everything, no matter how mundane. She also had ironclad boundaries. Jess didn't do anything that she didn't want to do, ever. So while I slept with my face smashed against the cool kitchen counter until one p.m. (the longest I'd slept in since college), Jess managed to dress the girls, have the broken window repaired by "some guy," install security cameras, because she had "a friend," and do a coffee and pastry run so there would be caffeine and sugar when I woke up.

"It's kinda creepy, honestly," Jess said.

"Yeah, it is. And thank you," I said, a knot forming in my throat. Maybe I didn't win the lottery in the parent or husband department, but I sure as fuck had the best sister in the world.