Audrey Niffenegger - Her Fearful Symmetry

“Apparently it started out that way. But lately she’s been quite-active. Yesterday I watched Valentina playing backgammon with Elspeth. Elspeth won.”

Jessica shook her head. “Granting that what you tell us is true, and understand, please, that I find it most unlikely-what good could come of it?”

Robert shrugged.

“It seems to put you in a difficult position,” James said. “This situation never works out very well for the man.” Robert thought, What precedent could you possibly be citing? and looked at James quizzically. “In literature. And myth. Eurydice, Blithe Spirit, that lovely story by Edith Wharton-”

“ ‘Pomegranate Seed,’” supplied Jessica.

“Thank you, yes. The lovers and husbands all end badly.”

“I asked her to kill me, so I could be with her. She refused.”

“I should hope so!” said Jessica, aghast.

“This won’t do,” said James. “Let us help you. We’ll take you on holiday.”

“Who will run the cemetery?” asked Robert, smiling.

“Who cares ?” replied Jessica. How can he joke about this? “Nigel and Edward will sort it out between them. Where shall we go? Paris? Copenhagen? We’ve never been to Reykjavík, they say it’s marvellous this time of year.”

“Let’s go somewhere warm and sunny,” said James. The evening was becoming overcast. He felt tired, and the thought of travelling farther than Highgate High Street made his back ache. He held out his glass, and Jessica refilled it.

“Spain,” said Jessica. She and James smiled at each other. “Or perhaps the Amalfi coast?”

“That could happen,” said Robert. “Any of it. It sounds fantastic.” Why not? he thought. I could just walk away. Let the three of them sort it out. The twins would reconcile, and live happily ever after with Elspeth… He sighed. He knew he wasn’t going anywhere. Still, it sounded so simple. “Let’s talk about it.”

“We ought to eat something,” said Jessica. “I feel my tummy flapping at my spine.”

“I’ll order takeaway from the Lighthouse, shall I?” said Robert. “Scampi?” He stood up, unsteadily, and went inside to call.

Jessica and James sat quietly, listening to Robert walking through their house. They heard him pick up the phone in the hall, his low voice ordering food.

James said, “Ought we to tell anyone? We could call Anthony…”

Jessica put her hands over her eyes. I am so tired. “I don’t know. What does one do when one’s dear young friend is being haunted?”

“Don’t you think he told us so that we would do something?”

“Have him committed, do you mean?”

James hesitated. “He talked of killing himself.”

“No, I think he was trying to get Elspeth to kill him.” She snorted.

“I don’t like it at all.”

“No. Do you think he would come away with us?”

James sighed. “Do you think we could manage if he had a breakdown in some foreign hotel room?”

“We ought to do something. ”

Robert reappeared. “I’m going to walk down the hill and pick up the food.” He sounded completely cheerful and normal. James offered him some money, and Robert said thanks, but it was on him. He walked off, almost sober-seeming. Paris. Rome. Saskatchewan. Robert hummed softly as he came out onto the street and began to walk over to the Archway Road. He walked faster; the evening was cooling off rapidly. Adelaide. Cairo. Beijing. It doesn’t matter where I go, she’ll still be stuck in that flat, plotting a resurrection. This made him laugh. This is brilliant; I’m walking down the street giggling like Peter Lorre. He had to stop and lean against the newsagent’s; he was bent over laughing. Cancún, Buenos Aires, Patagonia. I could get on the tube just across the street and be at Heathrow in an hour. No one would know. He stood up, gasping, closed his eyes. God, I feel ill. He stood that way, eyes closed, arms wrapped around his middle, for a few minutes. Robert opened his eyes. The world tilted, then righted itself. He began to walk down the hill, very slowly. This won’t do. I have to fetch the food. James and Jessica will worry. People stared at him as they passed by. The problem is…I’m too responsible. She knows I’ll do it because if I don’t…if I don’t… He nearly passed by the fish restaurant, but habit saved him and he managed to go in and pay for the food. As he trudged back up the hill a thought came to Robert: I ought to read those diaries. Elspeth gave them to me and I ought to read them. He began to repeat over and over again, “The diaries, the diaries.” When he got back to the Bateses’ house the food was cold and Jessica and James were in the kitchen eating soup. Jessica put him to bed in their guest room.

In the morning he crawled out of bed with a hangover and a feeling of having forgotten something. Jessica made him drink a foul-tasting concoction that included bananas, tomatoes, vodka, milk and Tabasco sauce. Then she fried some eggs and sat with him while he ate. James had already gone to the cemetery.

Jessica said, “James and I talked it over last night and we think you need looking after. Would you like to come and stay with us? We have loads of room.” She smiled.

Robert’s heart leapt. Here was the escape hatch he had been searching for; the words of acceptance were nearly on his tongue when he thought, Wait. If I’m staying here I won’t be able to go to the cemetery at night. He said, “May I think about it?”

“Of course,” Jessica said. “We’ll be here.”

He thanked her and left the house in the mood of a shipwrecked man who has allowed the rescue ship to pass him by.

Robert finally remembered his resolution to read the diaries the following morning. With trepidation he heaved the boxes onto the bed and began to go through them.

Just pretend it’s research, he told himself. It won’t bite. The diaries began in 1971: Elspeth and Edie were twelve. He was relieved to see that they ended, abruptly, in 1983, long before he himself entered the picture; Robert had not been looking forward to reading about himself. The diaries were a hodgepodge of school gossip, comments on books she was reading, musings about boys; some of the writing seemed to be in code. The author carried out long conversations and arguments with herself; suddenly Robert realised that Elspeth and her twin had written the diaries together. The effect was strangely seamless. It made Robert uneasy. There were symbols in the margins that appeared only during holidays and seemed to mean something about Elspeth and Edie’s parents; there was a plan to run away that came to nothing. But Robert knew her home life had been unhappy: there were no real surprises, only an ominous sadness that mixed with ordinary girl things, netball and the school play and such. The later volumes detailed university life, parties, the twins’ first apartment. Jack appeared on the scene, at first as one of many handsome, eligible young men, then as someone around whom everything suddenly revolved. As an only child, Robert had a certain curiosity about other people’s siblings. Elspeth and Edie seldom wrote in the first person singular; it was almost always “we” who went to the movies or sat an exam. Robert ploughed on, wondering what he was searching for in Elspeth’s juvenilia.

The bomb came in the last diary; Elspeth had tucked an envelope inside the cover. The envelope was labelled “Big, dark, horrible secrets.” It had a skull and crossbones inexpertly drawn under this inscription. The skull was smiling. Oh, Elspeth. I don’t want to know. Robert held the envelope and considered burning it. Then he slit it open.