J. Lennon - Castle

“The door was unlocked,” I said, as she passed over the threshold and into the living room, still empty of furniture.

“You might have taken me for a thief,” she said. “Figured you might shoot me or something.”

She inhaled deeply from her cigarette and blew smoke up toward the ceiling.

I unshouldered my pack and let it fall to the floor. “I’d appreciate it,” I said, “if you would not smoke inside the house.”

This elicited a smile. “That’s my little brother,” she said. “I guess you don’t have an ashtray. Maybe you could find me a plate.”

I went to the kitchen and beckoned for her to follow. She took a seat at the little round wooden table I had bought, and I found an old china plate in the cupboard, one that had been here when the house was abandoned. I considered sitting down with her, but something kept me standing. I leaned against the stove and crossed my arms over my chest.

“Two chairs,” she said, stubbing out her cigarette. “Expecting somebody?”

“The table came with two chairs.”

“Right.”

We stared at one another for several minutes more. Of course I recognized my sister now: the thick, high, arched eyebrows; the long chin; the narrow shoulders and nervous blinking. But it was clear why she had failed to register at first. Living had changed her. She was older than I, but that did not account for the difference. Whereas I had staved off the worst effects of aging with exercise, self-discipline, and healthy eating, Jill had indulged herself from an early age, abusing her body, sleeping irregularly, and running with a dissolute, irresponsible crowd. It was obvious, to look at my sister now, that she had continued with her unsavory ways, and had suffered for it. To be perfectly honest, I pitied her.

As for the many years we had remained out of touch, it is impossible to lay blame at her feet or mine. But she had not, to the best of my recollection, given me any reason to desire her continued love and friendship. She appeared only briefly at our parents’ funeral, and if I remembered correctly, she was under the influence of drugs and alcohol. Even then, at twenty-four, she had already begun to age beyond her years, her face wan, her hair lank, and her eyes heavy and underslung with blue. What I saw now, in my kitchen, only confirmed what I might have imagined, had I ever had the desire to imagine it. Hers was clearly a wasted life — for my sister was not an unintelligent woman, nor had she always been cruel or apathetic. In fact, I harbored memories of her comfort, her companionship, when we were small children. I remembered the way she would hold me in her arms when I cried out of misery or fear, the way she stroked my hair and told me everything would be all right.

I assumed that she had never left the area, and asked if this were so. Her response was a rough cackle.

“Oh, Jesus no, little brother,” she said. “I was out west for years. That’s where I was when Mom and Dad bought it. I used to send you postcards, remember?”

I didn’t remember any such thing. But I lied that I did, to encourage her to continue, which she seemed eager to do. People, in my long experience, want to talk. They may believe they wish to keep secrets, and they may believe that they are capable of doing so. But the truth is that secrets exist to be revealed; and it is usually very easy to find the combination of words that will cause them to emerge.

My sister continued. “I was out in San Francisco then. But one of my boyfriends moved north — he got a job at a little school up on a mountain. I lived there awhile. Then I drifted. I lived in Oregon and Montana. I ended up meeting a fella at a music festival. He said he was from around here. Eventually we got married and his mom broke her hip and we came back here to take care of her. But she died.”

“You’re married?” I asked. There was no ring on her finger.

“Dammit, Eric, let me finish. We tried having a baby and it didn’t work out, I had a miscarriage. And after that we figured out we didn’t really want to be together anymore anyway. So we divorced, and I took up with Hank.”

“Hank,” I repeated.

“Yeah, my boyfriend. Man friend.” She snorted. “He’s got a spread out on Julep Hill. He’s a big hunter. So I live with him. I’ve been there like ten years. So in answer to your question, little bro, no, I left the area plenty. And I happen to be back. Just like you.”

“I see,” I said to her, although I did not regard our respective returns to be comparable. “How did you know I was here?”

“Somebody saw you in town.”

“Who?”

“A friend. And then I asked around.”

“Hmm.”

“Which leads me to the big question,” she said.

I waited for her to ask it, whatever she thought it was.

“Eric.”

“Yes?”

“What in the hell are you doing here?”

It was very like my sister to overdramatize such a question. But the fact was, my decision to move back to the Gerrysburg-Milan area was of no concern to her, and I did not intend to discuss it. Saying so, however, would merely intensify her questioning. I wanted her to leave. So, instead, I gave a curt reply.

“I needed a change,” I said.

This explanation managed to elicit laughter. “So you come here? ” she said. “Beautiful.”

“The land is affordable, and I know the area well.”

“Yeah, you can say that again!”

“I don’t understand.”

She frowned, tilting her head. “Never mind,” she said. And then she averted her eyes for a moment, shifted in her seat, and looked up at me again. I was taken by surprise: her face was sober now, pained, and for the first time she appeared to me as a genuine adult. When her eyes again met mine, it was by the force of great effort and determination.

“Eric, look,” she said. “I want you to know that… I understand. About what happened. And, you know. I’m here for you.”

Anger was beginning to well up in me, and I struggled to tamp it down. The tone Jill had assumed was intensely familiar: that of the wise older sister, the protector, the paragon of selflessness and care. Did she have even the slightest idea how pathetic, how manipulative, she appeared to me now? The illusion of maturity that had tricked me just moments ago was torn away, and she was revealed for what she was: needy, self-absorbed, and small.

“I’m sorry, Jill,” I said, my jaw tight. “But I’m afraid you don’t understand at all.”

She opened her mouth to speak, closed it, exhaled slowly through her long nose. She turned to gaze out the kitchen window and appeared to gather herself.

“All right,” she said at last. “Maybe I don’t understand. But I know.”

“You may think you know something. But you know nothing.”

Now her lips tightened, and she shook her head, as if to say, “Why do I bother?”

I knew the gesture well, and it shames me to say that I lost my temper. The kitchen chair I stood beside found its way into my hands, and I lifted it three inches and banged it, with violent force, into my new linoleum floor.

“Enough!” I said to my sister, between clenched teeth. “Get out of my house.”

“Eric—” she began, but I would not hear it. I would not hear another word of hypocrisy from my sister’s mouth. The lies she had tortured me with — about our childhood, about our parents, our sad, doomed parents — would not be compounded. I knocked the chair to the floor with my open palm, and the pain that shot up my arm and into my shoulders registered as a kind of pleasure.

“Out!” I said. I suppose I was shouting. My sister stood up, trembling, and I must admit that I expected her familiar sneer to have taken its usual place on her face. But all I could find there was unhappiness and fear. Fear of my reaction, perhaps. But when a person has lived a life like hers, a life of promiscuity, rootlessness, and substance abuse, resentment and fear tend to replace all reasonable and proper emotions, and the world becomes your enemy.