“Nothing,” Kate had said after a few moments. “There’s nothing she could have done to deserve it.”
“I know,” Lulu had said. “But in Scotty’s mind? What was she thinking?”
Kate didn’t take her eyes off Sam. Now she was petting Popcorn’s head; now she had her arms around his neck. The way she held him, cheek against his fur, reminded Kate of Beth.
“Beth loved two men,” Lulu had said, trying to answer her own question. “Was that it? She cheated on her husband. She refused to tell the men whose baby it was. Everybody but Scotty is a sinner.”
“She was . . . our friend,” Kate had said, fighting waves of fury and hate. “I don’t care why she did it—she killed Beth.”
Lulu had given Kate a little shove, making her push over slightly, squeezing onto the chair beside her. Kate had felt the warmth of Lulu’s arm around her shoulder.
The front door slammed, and Sam walked into the room. She was lit from behind, from sunlight pouring through the tall window. She looked like an angel holding a rabbit. She placed Clementine on Kate’s lap and sat at her feet.
“It was Mrs. Waterston?” she had asked.
Kate nodded, hardly able to see through her tears. What would it be like for Sam, to know her closest friend’s mother had killed Beth?
“It wasn’t Dad,” Sam said, choking as she said the words, tears pouring down her face. “At least it wasn’t him. But oh, Aunt Kate. She was like family to us.” She couldn’t speak for a few seconds. “I can’t stand thinking of Mom knowing it was her. Feeling her best friend kill her.”
Kate stood up to hug Sam. Her niece’s words flowed through her, and for that instant Kate was Beth, imagining how it felt to have the life crushed out of her by someone she had loved her whole life.
“I saw the detective take her away,” Sam said. “She had handcuffs on. Isabel was screaming. Julie was crying.”
Kate nodded. She had seen and heard them too.
“Mom had to visit her father in prison, and now Isabel’s going to have to go there to visit her mother. Will she and I even stay friends?”
Kate hugged her because she didn’t have the answer. She remembered the old phrase: best friends forever. It hadn’t worked out that way.
Outside, tires crunched on the gravel. Kate heard a car door slam. The sound startled Clementine, and she scampered across the room. Sam went to look out the window.
“Who is it?” Lulu asked.
“Detective Reid’s back,” Sam said.
Kate watched Clementine hide beneath the desk chair. She walked over to the desk and reached for The Lives of the Artists. She opened to the last page, saw the heart and all their initials. K, L, S, and B.
Footsteps sounded in the hallway. She didn’t turn around. She heard Pete’s voice greeting Conor. Someday Conor would apologize to him for getting it wrong, or maybe he wouldn’t. She heard Lulu saying they should leave, that it was time to go home. She heard Sam trying to coax Clementine out from her hiding place, but still Kate didn’t turn around. She couldn’t take her eyes off the page where four young girls had once written their initials in blood.
They had been sisters and best friends; they had made promises to each other. There would be no secrets. There would be only love.
“Come on,” Lulu said gently. “It’s time to go.”
Kate stared at the page. She heard low voices behind her.
Leaning down, she kissed B for Beth.
“Kate?” Conor said from the doorway.
Kate stood tall and walked toward the detective. He put his arms around her, and they stood together, rocking back and forth.
“You okay?” he asked, leaning back enough so he could look into her eyes.
She shook her head but felt a small smile deep inside.
He gazed at her as if he could see into her soul, as if he knew what she was thinking: that she could never really lose her sister. She crouched to pick up Clementine. She held her gently in her arms, felt her heart lightly beating through her soft fur.
Then together they had all walked out of the room.
60
May 5
Oh, Kate.
We walk through the meadow holding hands. Up the slant of the hill we go, until we near the top, up above our grandmother’s house. It is late afternoon, the first Tuesday of May, and golden light washes over the green grass, and the air is warm. Those cold days of November have long passed, and the earth is starting to bloom. My fingers interlock with my sister’s. In her other hand, she carries a small carton with handles and holes for air.
Can you feel me with you? I ask her.
Yes, she says out loud.
I believe she can, although it is hard to know. The unshakable certainty I had last summer, when my body died, has given way to a sense that being definite is an illusion. It doesn’t actually matter. Nothing is solid; nothing is black and white. Love is fluid, and so is peace, without shape or edges, fresh water flowing from the river’s mouth into the sea.
She named her rabbit for my favorite fruit, for the color of the dress I wore the day Lulu and I cut Moonlight from the frame. I once despaired over that act, feeling that if I hadn’t done it, I might have lived. Telling Scotty that I had done it deliberately to hurt my husband had filled her with poison. How could I not respect my husband when she loved hers so much, when he was turning away from her?
Now Scotty is in prison, just like my father. My father desires retribution; he would like to see her die. What happens to Scotty is not my concern. I left her behind on my last day, when she followed me upstairs from the garden, when I pointed out the blank spot on the wall where Moonlight had hung, when she told me she was tired of my life.
Those were her words: “I am sick of your life.”
So she took it from me.
Lulu wasn’t wrong: everyone but Scotty was a sinner.
I have a journey to take. Scotty will go on trial, and she will tell the truth—that I attacked her, slapped her when she accused me of cheating, of not respecting my husband or myself, of not even respecting my lover enough to tell him he was Matthew’s father. Kate and Sam have suffered all along; they were collateral damage of her act, and they will see this through. They will do it for me.
Kate. I say her name. Kate.
Her name is contained—it is hard, while my name is soft. Say it out loud: Beth. It sounds like a breeze. Then say Kate: it starts with a sharp K sound and ends with a hard T. I used to think, after our mother died, that her name was perfect for her. She had shut herself off in a castle to protect herself, with rock edges of impenetrable walls. I used to feel her watching me, perplexed, wondering how I could stay open to the world after what had been done to us.
And for so long, she stayed that way.
I don’t take credit for what has happened to her in these last months, but I think her love for me, missing me, has let her realize that life is so short, over in the blink of an eye. She rescued Clementine because she couldn’t save me. The rabbit with soft fur healed and is alive because of Kate’s care.
Kate’s love helps me forgive myself for my own death. The choices I made, the people I hurt. But now I know—the best of us waste our time repenting, forgiving everyone but ourselves. And the worst don’t even realize there is anything to forgive. Hungry ghosts wander the earth, trapped in the bardo, seeking redemption that had been there all along.