Henry's Sisters (24 page)

We bought new red canopies for the front, and Dad had
BOMMARITO’S BAKERY
written in gold on the front window. He worked tirelessly with, what seemed to me, great joy. He insisted on paying for the repairs.

‘A small gift to the Bommarito family,’ he said quietly. ‘One small gift.’

When we were flooded with customers one day, we gave him an apron and an invitation, and he went to work. He came back the next day when we asked, and the next. I cried into my mixing bowls as I saw my dad flip open his old cookbooks and bake the desserts we’d baked as children, his face at peace.

All of his desserts looked exactly like the pictures.

Sometimes I caught him gazing at me, Cecilia, Janie, Henry, or the girls and I was stunned by the expression on his face: gratefulness. Happiness. Wonder.

And, the most important emotion, love.

I saw it.

I felt it.

I felt that love.

I had missed that love more than I would have missed my own heart.

When Bao and Dad had a break, they played chess.

I couldn’t hear what they said to each other, but one day I saw Bao make a slitting motion across his neck, so I knew he was telling my dad what happened to his throat.

Another day I saw my dad making a karate chop slice with his hand and I knew he was telling Bao what happened to his fingers.

And one time I heard Bao say to my dad, ‘I wish you peace, Carl. That what you need. That what I need. Peace.’

My dad nodded.

Bao moved his knight.

Dad moved his bishop.

‘Peace for us, peace for them,’ my dad said. ‘Checkmate.’

‘The girls are exactly like us,’ Janie said, rinsing a bowl after Blow Your Mouth Off Chilli Night. Each of us sisters had made our specialty chilli, with our personal secret recipe. All of them were spicy enough to bring tears to our eyes.

Cecilia’s won for spiciest and best. No surprise there. It ’bout blew out my eardrums.

‘Hopefully the girls will end up saner,’ I mused, as I stared out the window at Kayla and Riley under the willow tree.

‘At least less angry,’ Cecilia said, with anger. ‘That’s what I wish for them. Less anger.’ She dropped a glass and the shards spun over the counter. ‘Damn. That makes me mad.’

‘I think loss makes people angry,’ Janie said. ‘And fear. It’s a psycho-emotional shake-up that gets us out of balance with the universe. That’s why I have my healing herbs.’

‘Herbs scherbs,’ Cecilia said, blowing hair out of her eyes.

‘Herbs will bring you into focus, into your own softness and gentleness, so your body and mind will harmonise.’ Janie shook her red hair out of her bun. Her hair sure was getting long.

‘Harmonise this, Janie: I’m a fat, angry mom who will burn all your herbs to a crisp if you don’t stop with that New Wave herb crap.’

Here came the peacemaker. Again. ‘I remember when you started being angry all the time, Cecilia.’

‘When? Damn!’ She sucked on her finger where glass had punctured the skin.

‘When Dad left.’

‘Well, gee. I didn’t know you were so bright, Isabelle!’ She clapped her hands to her head. ‘You shoulda been a rocket scientist!’

‘You’ve transferred your anger to Parker.’

‘Whoee! More brilliance!’

‘And to Dad.’

‘You’re Einstein, Isabelle.’

I dried off a pan. ‘When are you gonna get rid of your anger, Cecilia?’

‘When? Never.’

‘Let’s not fight,’ Janie said. ‘We’ll ruin our inner spherical balance.’

‘We’re not fighting,’ I said. ‘I’m worried that your anger is going to kill you, Cecilia.’

Cecilia shoved her hands in the soapy water. ‘I am, too. I’ve been angry for decades.’

‘And you hate, Cecilia. You hate this person or that person…there’s always someone you hate. Our whole lives, there’s been somebody.’

‘They deserved it.’

‘That’s not the point. You’ve gotta get rid of your hate. It’s a living, breathing parasite in you.’

‘What about you, Isabelle?’ she snapped, flicking a dish towel against the counter. ‘You’ve battled depression
forever—’

‘I’m enjoying the fight.’

‘You’ve been with a truckload of men.’

‘Probably two truckloads. I’m not proud of it.’

‘You travel to horrible places and it unglues you even further.’

‘I was unglued to begin with.’ And I missed my photographic jaunts, I finally admitted to myself. How I missed photography. I missed it like I’d miss my soul.

‘Don’t be a hypocrite, Isabelle.’

She had a point. ‘OK, I’ll try to stick it to my depression if you try to stick it to your hate and anger.’

Cecilia whipped that towel against the counter again.

‘Well, let’s get the tapper-counter in on this. Janie, you gotta stop it with all your checking and hermit behaviour and tapping.’

‘Oh, I don’t know…’ she wobbled.

‘Come on, Embroidery Queen,’ I said.

She put her hands on her hips.

Cecilia whacked her with the towel. ‘Should I hit you four times?’ she mocked.

‘I’ll go upstairs to my serenity corner and think about it,’ Janie said.

‘Tap, tap, tap, tap,’ Cecilia mocked.

‘Shut up, Cecilia,’ Janie said, slamming a glass on the counter. ‘I don’t refer to you as fathead or meatball butt or thunder thighs or Queen Double Chin or Sag and Drag, so stop making fun of me.’

Whew. That silence was rigid and tight, tight, tight, once again. I moved between them so Cecilia would not annihilate Janie.

‘My therapist says I need to become stronger with my social-familial conflicts and stand up for myself with womanly courage, so I am!’ Janie declared. ‘If you’re going to be mean, I’ll be mean!’

Electrifying
silence.

I braced myself to physically defend Janie when Cecilia leapt for her throat.

Janie waited with bated breath for Cecilia to lash out at her.

But a surprising thing happened then: Cecilia laughed. She whipped that towel against the counter and laughed. ‘I’m so mad at you, Janie, I could… I could spit!’

‘Spit?’ Janie asked.

‘Yes, spit!’ She spat in the sink. ‘But I am fat! I do have thunder thighs! I think I have three chins, not two; my boobs are always sweaty; my pits smell no matter what I do; and my mouth is out of control, so who am I to argue? But I’m still so
ticked off
!’

‘You gotta stop, Cecilia,’ I said quietly. ‘Your anger could kill me. I feel it all the time.’

Cecilia’s eyes widened, and her chin wobbled. ‘You feel it all the time?’

‘Pretty much, Cecilia,’ I said. ‘I feel my own depression, but I feel you, too.’

She rested her head on the counter, straightened up, cracked the towel twice. ‘I’m sorry, Isabelle.’

‘It’s OK. I’m sorry you have to smell the vague scent of a cigarette after my one-night stands.’

‘Me too. I get none of the fun.’

‘But you don’t smoke, Isabelle,’ Janie observed.

‘It’s a strange tie we have, odd, inexplicable…’

‘What do you think will happen when one of us dies, Is?’ Cecilia asked.

I knew she was referring to our freak twin connection. ‘I don’t know.’ I hardly wanted to think about it.

But since we are so attuned to one another, when Cecilia died, would I? Or vice versa? Probably not. But it wouldn’t feel good. ‘OK, Cecilia, we’re gonna make a pact. If you or I get terminally ill and our brains are fried, our bodies are rotting, or we’re in grave pain and the other twin is feeling the same thing, the sick twin needs to get one of the .45s out and get it over with.’

‘Let’s get off this unpleasant subject of dying with its unpleasant aura!’ Janie said. ‘Cheerful, soul-feeding subjects only!’

Cecilia wiped her hand on the dish towel, then flicked it again. She held her hand out and I shook it. ‘Deal.’

We both knew we were completely serious.

Wednesday night I was back singing on stage at the church for the teenagers.

Father Mike bopped around in the front row, smiling, dancing. His dancing resembled that of a puppet and a Gumby doll. The kids loved it.

‘Isabelle,’ Father Mike said to me when all the kids in that giant gang were off at their classes, ‘I have to tell you again, my girl, it’s so good to have you back in the church! It’s so good!’

I cringed. I was not exactly back in the church. In fact, on Sunday mornings I was usually sleepin’ my sorry ass off, exhausted from the week. ‘Well, Father, I’ve been meaning to get to mass, I have.’ I stopped. Don’t ever lie to a priest. It’s not a good idea. ‘Well, I’ve been thinking about going to mass.’ Sheesh. ‘I may come to mass sometime in the future.’

‘Thatta girl,’ he said to me, fists raised in triumph. ‘We’re lucky to have you and I know the angels above are appreciating that voice of yours.’

‘The only way the angels are appreciating my scratchy voice is if they’re half-deaf and like the sound of broken glass.’

Father Mike laughed, then he patted the pew and I sat next to him.

For a long time we stared at the cross on the altar.

‘What’s on your heart, Isabelle?’

The familiar question I’d grown up with was my undoing. It’s how Father Mike dug deep into all his flock. ‘
What’s on your heart?
’

I started out slow, then the words flew out faster, and I held my head, hiccupping along with my tears, Father Mike’s eyes compassionate and forgiving. ‘I don’t think I’m good enough for God.’

‘Dearest Isabelle! All of us are good enough for God. Every one of us. He made us, He created us. He has a plan for us. And you, Isabelle, are a gift to everyone who knows you. God’s gift.’

‘God’s gift has sinned so much. Father Mike, I have hated my momma. I have run from my family…’

‘Your family, your momma, is complex, the relationships often difficult, made more difficult by circumstance. God gave you this family so you could take what you’ve learnt and help others.’

‘I think I’ve broken near to all the commandments, except I haven’t whacked anyone off.’

‘And beyond those broken commandments you will find God’s grace and mercy.’

‘I left God.’

‘He never left you, Isabelle Bommarito. Never. Not for a minute.’

‘I walked away from the church.’

‘He stayed with you on your walk.’

‘I have sinned a million times.’

‘And beyond those sins you have God’s love. You always did. His love is infinite. It is eternal.’

It was midnight when we were done.

‘You are a child of God, dear Isabelle. Don’t let your past regrets and guilt and the memories of who you
used
to be ruin one more minute of your present or your future. It’s done. Go on knowing you’re forgiven. Walk with God, Isabelle. He’s put out His hand to you many, many times. All you have to do is put your hand out to Him.’

I put my hand out to Father Mike. He held it.

We sat in front of that cross for a long time.

‘We’re not going to let him back in our lives just like that, damn it,’ Cecilia raved. ‘No way. He thinks he can leave for years and then slip right back in to the family? Pick up where he left off. Be Dad again? Forget it. Asshole.’

We had closed the bakery and the three of us were cleaning up. Henry had handed out samples of peanut brittle and was sitting in a booth drawing a bird. His stomach was hurting again, so I’d brought him milk.

The girls were doing their homework next to Henry. Riley had not pulled out any hair that I’d seen. She had not run from her current shrink, either, for two weeks, which was a cause for family celebration. We’d had a ‘Hooray, She Hasn’t Run’ party last night at home with steak and potatoes and a huge pink cake.

Kayla was wearing an orange monk’s outfit and chanting softly.

‘But Cecilia,’ Janie protested, rinsing out a bowl that had been used for truffle cake, ‘he’s so nice! He makes us laugh! Spiritually, he brings harmony to our lives!’

‘No, spiritually he’s manipulating us,’ Cecilia hissed, words dropping out of her mouth like teeny tiny swords. ‘He’s getting to each one of us one at a time. He’s going for you, first, Janie, because you’re a sucker for sob stories.’

‘I am not a sucker for sob stories!’

‘Yes, you are,’ Cecilia and I said.

Janie took out the sprayer from the sink and sprayed us, the water arching into the air.

‘Stop it, Janie!’ Cecilia threw a wooden spoon at her.

‘You started it by saying I’m a sucker.’ She sprayed us again.

I ducked behind a counter. ‘I don’t need a shower, Janie.’

‘All I’m saying,’ Cecilia said, wiping her face off with a towel, then throwing it to me, ‘is that we can’t let him come back again.’

‘He’s already back,’ I said. ‘And I thought you were going to work on your anger.’

‘Come on, Isabelle, give me a break. I would think you’d want to break his neck, like I do.’

I joined Janie at the sink and started cleaning a pan that I had used for pastries.

‘What? You’re not talking to me, Isabelle?’

‘I’m talking to you.’

‘Then why aren’t you answering my question? Does your mouth not work?’

Watching Cecilia’s anger is like watching a fire take hold. It simmers, it grows into tiny orange flames, then it leaps, and it burns down the whole darn forest, taking Bambi and all those furry friends with it.

‘Helloooooo…’ Cecilia mocked. ‘Yoo-hooo.’

I turned off the water and crossed my ankles as I leant against the sink.

Cecilia glared, feet apart, stomach heaving.

How to start? My hair was dripping from where Janie had sprayed me. I had flour on my arms. My apron was smeared in orange and yellow icing, the colours I’d used today on a birthday cake I’d made in the shape of a monarch butterfly.

My braids were gone, my hair was short. I was almost completely detached from my life in Portland and, after a few stark and brutal realisations about myself after the attack, I didn’t think I’d ever live there again. I was checking in on Momma, visiting with Henry, watching over Grandma. I was working with my sisters, running a business, and fighting with the lingering blame/guilt/nerve-shattering fear from the attack.

But I was also so settled…so, dare I say it,
content
in Trillium River.

I didn’t even feel like my old self anymore.

Where had she gone?

Where was the old self?

I didn’t know. And here’s a fact: I didn’t miss her.

‘What?’ Cecilia noisily rearranged metal mixing bowls. ‘You’re gonna stand there like a baboon? Forgot your brain somewhere?’

‘I haven’t forgotten my brain.’ I stopped weighing my odds for this conversation and decided blunt was best. ‘My depression has blocked out the light in my life for years. It was a part of me, a part of my life, a part of who I was, starting when we were kids. It was like infected, toxic sludge running through my veins. I isolated myself except from you two and Henry. I slept around. I have lived almost solely for myself, by myself for twenty years. I have been miserably lonely and alone for most of my adult life.’

‘But you’ve had us!’ Janie squealed, looping an arm around my shoulders.

‘The only time I’m not lonely is when I’m with you two and Henry,’ I said. And that was the truth. The utter truth.

Cecilia bent her head.

‘Goodness! Me too!’ Janie agreed. ‘Me too. I’m lonely without you three! My spirit alone, wandering, searching.’

‘I shut down on the rest of the world. Shut them out, including my responsibility to you here, Cecilia, and the family.’

I wiped my hands on my apron. I didn’t think the girls were listening, but I wasn’t sure. Riley was fiddling with her hair. Kayla fiddled with her monk outfit. At least she did not have her burka on.

‘If Dad wants back into our lives, I welcome him back. Will he stay forever? I don’t know. Probably not. People are people. But I’m not going to base my own happiness on whether or not he stays.’

Janie fluffed her pink apron. ‘I hope he stays…’

Cecilia snuffled and sniffled.

‘I can’t be angry anymore. I cannot spend one more day of my life being angry. I can’t be angry at you two, at Momma, at Dad, our past. I can’t do it. I almost died with that creep in my loft. I think I’ll struggle the rest of my life with what happened, but I finally saw how much I don’t want to live in a grave.’

This was going to be the hard part. I tightened my jaw and tried not to lose it.

‘I actually believe I can be happy here in Trillium River. For me to believe I can be happy,
at all
, is a miracle. I like it here. I like the people. We’re going to a barbeque next week at our ex-English teacher’s house.’ I smiled. I had loved Mrs Lary. ‘Lin Chi is pregnant and we’re all going to a damn baby shower. We’re going to Tommy and Kathleen’s wedding in September.’ I matched a sniffle with Cecilia. ‘And I have you two and Henry and Grandma and the sweet River.’ We all laughed at that. ‘I love you, my sisters. I truly love you both.’

‘Oh, oh, oh, you’re talking serenity, Isabelle! Serenity!’ Janie said. ‘And I love you, too! I do!’ She brought her apron to her face and sobbed out her love.

Cecilia snuffled, her mouth twisting, face flushed.

‘I’m not mad at Dad anymore,’ I admitted, throwing up my hands. ‘The man’s a Vietnam War vet and he flipped out when he got home. You know I spent months in Vietnam, interviewed ex-Vietnamese fighters and Vietnam War vets here for that documentary on the war. I heard the most gruesome, hair-raising stories, and I know this: if we had been in combat in Vietnam we probably would have flipped, too.’

In fact, I would have flipped and flipped again.

‘When he killed that man and went to jail, he’d been over the edge a long time. The man’s brother, for heaven’s sakes, Joseph Corelli, was the person who hired Dad right out of jail. Dad wrote to Joseph when he was in jail to apologise for what he did. They started writing letters and he forgave Dad. Apparently Joseph’s brother had been arrested several times for assault before that incident with Dad and was a real hothead. Dad’s worked for Joseph this whole time, until he was offered the position of Chief Financial Officer of TechEx.’

Cecilia put her hand to her heart. My heart jumped two beats and sped up.

‘It’s the love of the world going around!’ Janie said, fluttering.

‘So what has Dad done since he came back? He’s taken Henry fishing and hiking. He’s taken us all out to dinner several times. We went on a boat ride last weekend. He’s helped us fix this place up, he’s baking up a storm, and he won’t let us pay him. He’s hung out with Grandma and is making a model aeroplane with her and Henry. He drove Velvet to her colonoscopy appointment. He’s read drafts of Janie’s new book. Should he have come back sooner? Yes. No. Maybe.’

‘We had a great time getting scared together!’ Janie exclaimed. ‘I thought we’d have to get in a closet, but we didn’t!’

I hardly knew what to say to that, so I ploughed on. ‘There were extreme circumstances here that led to him abandoning us. He was suffering in a way that we will never, ever get. And if we accept that, accept that his suffering was caused by stupid men running a stupid war, and his mental state was in tatters, then here’s the next question: who are we not to welcome him home?’

‘I’ll do it! I will! I’ll welcome him!’ Janie said, flapping her apron. ‘I like him! He’s great!’

Janie hugged me.

Cecilia snuffled again, pushing her hair out of her teary face. ‘I
might
give him one shot to be a dad again. One shot.’

‘I think that’s a good idea,’ I said.

I hugged Cecilia. Janie hugged me. And when they were both relaxed, I grabbed the sprayer and soaked them both.

Cecilia somehow gave Dad a sign that she
might
give him another shot. I could tell he was delighted, not only to see Cecilia but to be with his granddaughters.

The girls were surprisingly enthused one day about a neighbour’s vegetable garden and how cool it was, and Dad took that idea and ran.

He asked Cecilia if she would like a vegetable garden and where, rented a rototiller, and he and the girls built raised beds for vegetables, flowers, blueberries, and strawberries. I noticed that our dad did not let that bum leg of his get in the way of anything.

As Riley said, ‘He’s one cool old guy. We even discussed astrophysics and the Hubble Telescope.’

A brainy dad, then. ‘He understands astrophysics?’

‘Oh, yeah. He said he loves to study astronomy. He even bought me a couple of books on supernovas, spiral galaxies, and meteorology.’ She rolled her lips in tight, then said, ‘I told him about my hair pulling. It’s not like he couldn’t see I’m going bald.’

‘How did that conversation go?’ I braced myself.

‘He was, like, cool about it. I told him sometimes I wear ski hats at night so I don’t pull at my hair and that I tried wearing mittens, too, but that didn’t work. You know, the mittens were supposed to make pulling hard, but all you have to do is take ’em off, so, yeah, like, that didn’t work.’

‘I’m sorry, Riley.’ I knew better than to tell her to stop. It would be like someone telling me to stop having depression as in – voilà – OK! Now it’s gone! Thanks for telling me to stop! Now I’m cured!

‘I told myself that when I pulled a hair out, I’d slap myself in the face, and I tried that, but it didn’t work. Then I tried giving myself an award like I could have ice cream if I didn’t pull or I could spend my allowance money on a science book, but that didn’t work, either. I have to pull my hair out. It’s like it lets out my stress. Dad thinks I’m ugly and he’s embarrassed, I can tell, and so does Constance. You think I’m not embarrassed? I know I’m ugly.’

‘You’re not ugly, Riley. You’re beautiful.’

‘No, I’m not, but Carl said I’m smart and funny and pretty and generous and I’ll be more compassionate towards other people and their problems because of my own.’

‘Smart man,’ I said. ‘He gets it.’

‘Yeah,’ Kayla interrupted. ‘He’s cool. He said I could wear my sari or my crosses or my fig leaf hat and say the rosary while we were planting the seeds or do some monk chanting. He’s radical.’ She paused. ‘He said no to the burka. He said that me dressed all in black scares him.’