My Sister's Keeper (5 page)

“
Okay,” she called. “You can come in now.”

6

I
GRIPPED THE DOORKNOB, turned it slowly, and pushed the door open. Except for a pair of white stockings from mid-thigh down, Ashleigh was stark naked. She lay amid a mountain of pillows with her arms thrown back over her head and her legs cocked outward at the knees. Half a dozen lighted candles scented the room and provided the only light. The sight of her took my breath away. She looked like a movie star—Julia Roberts in person, naked.

My internal control system changed gears and my movements slowed.

She raised a Polaroid camera high and giggled. “Take my picture, Mr. Photographer.”

I snickered. “You’re not going to get much of a picture with that thing.”

“
I don’t care. I just want to see what it looks like.”

I sipped my drink, set it on the dresser, took the camera, and stepped back. My heart thumped hard in my chest as I framed her in the viewer. She puckered her lips and cut her eyes at me.

“
Don’t try to look sexy,” I said. “Just relax.” Her face softened and her eyes smiled. “Bring your chin down just a little. That’s it.” I rose on my toes and pressed the shutter release. The camera’s tiny strobe blasted the room with light and a motor pushed the undeveloped photograph out the front and left it hanging there. She pushed the pillows aside and patted the bed next to her. “Now, take one for me. You don’t have to be naked, just get up here with me.”

“
I don’t think so,” I said, pulling the self-developing photo from the camera and tossing it on the dresser.

“
Please. The two of us.” She rolled onto her side. “Just this once.”

I could hardly hear the thunder for the blood rushing in my ears. “Why would you want a photo of me with you like that?” I placed the camera on the dresser and picked up my drink.

Bounding off the bed, she grabbed the camera and poked a finger into my chest. “What’s the matter, Mr. Photographer? Don’t like having your picture taken?”

I stumbled backward trying not to spill the drink. “Not like that, I don’t.”

“
You’re a famous director. This could be important to me.” She poked me again.

I laughed and juggled the drink. “I’m not a famous director and even if I was—” She pushed again and I got annoyed. My voice sounded dark and evil inside my head. “Ashleigh, stop that! You’re going to spill my drink.”

She lowered her head and rolled out her bottom lip. In that light, with her eyes sparkling and her beads dangling and her breasts jiggling and my head spinning, she was bewitching; almost irresistible. “I’ll tell you what. Put something on and we’ll take one.”

Throwing an arm around my neck, she kissed my cheek and at that instant, the camera went off with another blinding blast of light.

“
Oh, no!” she groaned turning it over to check the number on the back. “Thank goodness. There’s four more.” Tossing the wasted picture on the dresser, she set the camera on the foot of the bed, slid into a robe, and left the front of it hanging open. “Better?”

I sighed letting my eyes travel down to her breasts. “Well…”

“
Man, this is more than I wear to the mall.”

Drums were beating a steady rhythm in my brain. I was getting weak. “All right.”

I lifted the camera, downed the rest of my drink, and wrapped my left arm around her clasping the front of her robe together. With rain pelting the bedroom window, I turned the camera lens toward us, placed my thumb on the shutter, and stretched my right arm out as far as I could.

“
Ready?”

Lightning flickered. “Ready.”

Again the flash dazed me the instant it went off and Ashleigh shoved me backward onto the bed falling on top of me, tickling my ribs. Sliding up and down me, she teased me, daring me to touch her. With her beads slapping the side of my face, she brushed her lips lightly over mine and kissed me ever so gently. It was sweet and natural. Her fragrance filled my head and I felt as if I was suspended in some other place in some other time with a chorus of male voices holding the same note for what seemed like minutes.

Normally, the more selfish and demanding a woman is, the more distance I want between us. And she was way too young to be interested in me. At least, she should have been. Yet here she was—naked, squirreling around on top of me, and holding my hands to her breasts. Something inside told me there was something
wrong
.

I tried to roll her off me, but she flattened against me and held me down. The music in my head changed to harsh noises. My strength was gone and my limbs tingled. I raised my head and whispered, “Please, Ashleigh.”

“
What’s with you? Are you gay?”

I saw my father’s eyes glaring at me and felt the same heaviness in my heart that I always feel explaining myself to him. I shook my head from side to side, but no words came. My skin felt cold and the bed began to turn. My heart hammered against the walls of my chest and sweat ran down my neck. I threw my head back and gulped air.

“
Are you okay?” she asked.

“
I think…I need…to go.” I tried to move, but fell back against the bed.

“
Do you want another drink?”

The bed spun faster and my eyes rolled back into my head. I tried to raise my hand, but my arm wouldn’t co-operate. Damn. How much have I had to drink?

“
Ashleigh,” I whispered. “Can you…help me up?”

Straddling me on her hands and knees, she lifted my left eyelid and studied my pupil. “Don’t worry, Richard Baimbridge. You’ll be just fine.” She licked my cheek and that’s the last thing I remember until I awoke with a splitting headache around 3:30 a.m. laying on the deck outside my back door in a cold rain.

At 6:30 a.m., I awoke trembling. My clothes were still wet and every inch of my body ached. The last thing I could remember was passing out on Ashleigh’s bed. God, what must she think of me?

I tripped up the stairs, toppled into the shower, and stripped away my clothes. There were scratches on the back of my right hand. I wondered how I’d gotten them, how I’d gotten home, and if I’d made a fool of myself doing it. I turned the water on and lay under it for twenty minutes waiting for it to wash away the cobwebs and strange images, then cranked it up as hot as I could stand it and cleaned up.

Dressing for work, I noticed the deep gash stretching along my left jaw from ear to chin. Upon closer examination I found a second, smaller cut above my right eye. I poured antiseptic into the cuts and shaved. Descending the stairs, I found the note reminding me to stop by Mom’s on the way to work.

MY PARENTS’ TWO-STORY ROW HOUSE had been gloomy and forsaken back when I grew up in it and it appeared no differently now. The back door was unlocked and Dad sat at the dinette table reading The Morning Star in a faded plaid housecoat. His thin gray hair was combed straight back and lay flat against his head. His eyebrows were thick and grew together in a single line that made him appear to be in a constant state of disapproval.

He and I had never seen eye to eye on anything. Nothing. Not ever. I gave up trying to win his affirmation a long time ago. I just tried to stay out of his way and not give him any excuse to come down on me. Mom set out a fresh cup of coffee for me as I came in.

“
Thanks, Mom.” I kissed her cheek.

She took my jaw in her hand and twisted it to the side squinting those Bette Davis eyes at me. “What happened to your face?”

“
Scratched it in the bushes last night,” I sighed throwing a leg over a chair and sitting across from Dad.

“
Where you been?” he grumbled without even looking around the newspaper. “I thought you were coming early this morning.”

Mom flashed me her “Don’t Say Anything” look and pursed her lips. I reached for the sugar. “I said I’d come by on my way to work. I’m on my way to work.”

He popped the paper to straighten it. “I just don’t understand how come a boy who ain’t even got a job is always running late.”

Mom sighed. “Now don’t go starting in on Richie, Gus. He came by to help you with that bed. Now let him be.”

“
Why is that, boy?” he asked.

I lifted a spoon and stirred my coffee. “I’m self-employed, Dad.”

He rattled his paper again. “That’s why you ain’t got no wife. A woman wants to see a paycheck every week. Somethin’ she can count on.”

“
For Heaven’s sake, Dad. Are you ever going to get over the fact that I work for myself?”

“
You kids today don’t know what work is. I was on that car lot at seven o’clock
every
morning. The early bird catches the worm, I tell you. Thomas Jefferson said that. People’s known it for a long time.”

I lifted the coffee cup. “I think it was Ben Franklin, Dad.”

The paper jerked away and his open hand smacked the side of my face with a loud crack. My coffee cup bowled across the table spewing its hot contents over the table and me. “Always the smart-ass, ain’t cha?” he glared.

As I came up out of my chair, Mom clutched her arms around me from behind. “Stop it!” she screamed. “Both of you!”

I snatched the towel from her shoulder and dabbed at the hot coffee burning through my pants. “Jesus! You want my help or not?”

Dad crushed the paper against the table. “Go on to work! I don’t need your help.”

I threw the cloth on the table, wrenched out of Mom’s hold, and left the room. The head of Martha’s convalescent bed was raised and her hands skimmed back and forth over the laptop sitting on a stand in front of her. She had a pencil tucked behind an ear and a pair of glasses perched on the end of her nose.

She sensed I was there, but didn’t look up. “Hi.”

I tried to hide my anger. “Morning, Babe.”

Her fingers continued dancing over the keyboard. “Just need to get this thought down.”

I crossed to the window and looked out. It was not much of a view. A tree. The street. The houses across the street. This had been the dining room when we grew up, but the only time I remembered dining in here was at Thanksgiving every other year. I moved to her side and sat on the edge of the bed facing away from her. “What are you working on?”

“
It’s a surprise.” She finished with a flurry of keystrokes and lowered the screen. “It’s a novel. Give me a few more days. Then I’ll let you see it. I’m dying to get your thoughts on it.” I flopped back and lay next to her staring at the fake chandelier hanging from the ceiling. “Gosh, what happened to your face?” she asked.

I shook my head. “I don’t know. Scratched it.”

She raised her body off the mattress and winced as she slid down to get more comfortable. “Mom said you had a date last night. Did she do that?”

“
It wasn’t a date. It was the woman next door asking if I could help her get her power back on.”

“
Is she married?”

I cut my eyes at her. “No, she isn’t married, and she’s way too young for me.”

“
How young?”

“
Twenty…something.”

“
So? Girls like older men.”

Dad slumped into the room, gripped the foot of the bed, grunted, and lifted it off the floor. “Let’s get this done. Ain’t nobody going to keep a man that shows up late for work.”

I rolled off the bed and moved to the headboard. “I work for myself, Dad. I’m not going to fire myself.”

He dropped the foot of the bed. “You want to do this or not?”

Martha groaned from the jarring.

“
Hey! Take it easy, will you?”

Dad had short, thick legs, a barrel chest, and a day-old gray beard. He leaned his wide body over the foot of the bed and grabbed hold again. I must have taken after the men on Mom’s side of the family. Tall and slender.

We raised the bed and shifted it around so Martha could face the front window.

“
That’s it. Right there,” she announced. “Hey, would you look at that?” She aimed a finger at the window.

From behind her I had a clear view of the sidewalk and the houses across the street. “What?”

“
That bird.”

A red and black bird hopped along a branch to a nest under construction in the maple tree a few feet from the window.

“
It’s a Cardinal,” she said.

“
This where you want it?” Dad asked.

“
Oh, yes. This is perfect.”

“
Anything else you need, Darling?” he asked.

“
No. This is great, Daddy. Thanks.”

He kissed her forehead, then cut his eyes at me as he left. I moved the roll-around cart with her lamp and laptop back within reach of the bed. She grabbed my arm. “Don’t let Daddy get to you like that.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “He’s going through a lot right now.”