“Isabel is innocent, Vanessa.” I was surprised that my voice even worked. “You have a lot to be angry about, with your son, and what Connor did to your sister, but Isabel isn’t responsible for any of it. She was a victim, too.”
“Well, that’s where I have to disagree with you. Her complicity makes her responsible.”
“You’ll never get away with it,” Kira said, though she didn’t sound convinced herself.
Selena agreed: “Cops can always sniff out staged suicides. There are always clues.”
“Well,” Vanessa said, “lucky for all of us, between my medical degree and my experience staging suicides, I don’t think it’ll be a problem.”
Once again, we all settled back into gaping at her.
“I guess there’s no harm in telling you,” she said. “There are no secrets between us, at this point. I loved my sister dearly, but it became very clear to me that Allison was simply not up to the task of being Phoebe’s mom. She was always immature and impulsive—even her decision to keep the baby was so rash, so uninformed. Who does that? Especially after essentially getting assaulted? And who gets pregnant from one time, while on the pill? My sister, that’s who. Things always just happen to her. And then, what—she’s going to raise the baby on her own in her studio apartment?” Vanessa shook her head with exasperation and then looked at us like she expected us to agree. When we showed no reaction, she continued. “She was always like that, even as a kid. Making these reckless decisions that I had to help her undo after the fact. I couldn’t talk her out of keeping the baby, but it didn’t take long for her to prove me right—she fell apart quickly after Phoebe was born. She was hopeless at changing diapers, constantly falling asleep holding Phoebe. She could have rolled over and suffocated her! She had no idea how to soothe her. She couldn’t figure out a feeding schedule for anything. She barely left the house to take her for walks and fresh air. She just moped around all day. I had to do something.”
“So you killed your sister?” I couldn’t breathe as I spoke.
Vanessa bobbed her head from side to side, considering my question. “I don’t really look at it that way. I simply nudged her toward what she’d probably eventually have done herself anyway. She was heading down a dark path, trust me. I saved her some unnecessary pain by expediting the process for her—giving her some medications that, as it turns out, aren’t supposed to be mixed.” She shrugged as if it had all been an unfortunate accident.
“But look,” she continued, “I’m not a monster. I did it so that her daughter wouldn’t have to deal with the pain of having a weak, incompetent mother. In truth, I did it for Allison, because I knew deep down that she loved Phoebe and would want her to have the best life possible. And that’s with me, not with her.” Vanessa sighed. “It killed me to do it. It really did. I loved my sister. I mean, look at what I’m doing for her—killing the guy, the couple, who messed up her life. If that doesn’t prove sisterly love, I don’t know what does. And I’ll always miss her. But Phoebe deserved—deserves—a stronger mom than Allison.
“And this was a familiar road for me. I knew how this would end. Allison came by it honestly. Our mom died by suicide when we were young.” I remembered Vanessa mentioning her mom had passed away when she was young. She hadn’t said how, though, and I hadn’t asked. For the briefest moment, what I thought was grief clouded her eyes, but as quickly as it appeared, it was replaced by resentment, and she refocused herself. “Allison was too young to remember her, but I wasn’t. And it was easier for Allison that way. So I wanted to do the same for Phoebe. Because Allison was bound to follow in her footsteps, eventually. Allison’s always been like her.”
We all just sat with this for a few long moments. It was too much to process.
So Vanessa had killed her sister, taken her baby, killed Connor, and planned to kill Isabel, and now we were stuck in this situation, in this house, with her. How could you let yourself get here? I asked myself. How could you have messed everything up so badly?
I begged myself to speak again, but no words came. Finally, Selena said all I’d have said anyway. “Vanessa, it sounds like your sister had postpartum depression. That doesn’t mean she was going to commit suicide or would ‘approve’ of you murdering her. Postpartum is rough for practically everyone. She would have gotten better. You’re insane and delusional.” Selena was remarkably clear eyed as she spoke.