I took a deep sip of wine. She was exactly right—I could call my parents more often. The Incident, when I was nine, had affected my relationship with my parents, even though none of us wanted it to. My parents had felt guilty that they hadn’t somehow protected me from my abductor, though logically they had done nothing wrong. Their guilt, in turn, made nine-year-old me feel guilty for causing trouble and making my parents feel bad. Esther felt both guilty for not being there to protect me and resentful that for a long time I got more attention than she did, followed by guilt about the resentment. And the cycle went round and round, among four loving, well-meaning people who had no idea what else to do, and it was still going round twenty years later.
Sometimes, I thought I might like the cycle to stop. But my parents were in Florida now, and things were bumbling along well enough. There was no reason to dig up old bodies.
I watched Esther sprinkle garnish on our dinners with her beautiful, manicured hands as we stood in her beautiful kitchen. I shouldn’t be here, in my circle of darkness, making things harder for her. She should probably have a better sister. But she was stuck with me.
Will appeared in the kitchen doorway and leaned on the doorframe. “I waited long enough,” he said to Esther. “Did you tell her?”
I went still, my glass in my hand. “Tell me what?”
“I’m working up to it,” Esther said, still looking at her garnishes and not at me.
“You said you’d tell her,” Will said.
I looked at my sister, at the tense lines at the corners of her eyes, and my stomach turned. Was something wrong? “Tell me what?” I said again.
“It isn’t a big deal,” Esther said.
“It’s a big deal,” Will replied, his voice calm. “It’s been a big deal for two years.”
“Tell me,” I said, trying not to panic. “Please tell me.”
Esther sighed, the breath coming out of her from so deep that it changed the shape of her shoulders. Emotions flitted across her expression one by one: fear, stress, tense excitement, a hollow sort of sadness. She stopped fidgeting with the garnishes and turned to look at me. “We’re starting IVF next week,” she said.
I tried to compute this. “IVF? As in having a baby?”
“Yes.”
I looked back and forth from Esther to Will, trying to read their expressions. “Okay,” I said slowly. “Why IVF? Is there some kind of complication?”
“We don’t know,” Will said. He looked tense, too, though he didn’t look as tense as my sister, who was practically vibrating like a piano wire. “We just know we haven’t been able to get pregnant. We’ve been trying for two years.”
I put my wineglass down on the counter. “Two years?” I looked at Esther. She was leaning against the counter, staring down at her hands. I noticed for the first time that she hadn’t poured herself any wine. “You’ve been trying to have a baby for two years, and you didn’t tell me?” I said.
“She wanted to tell you,” Will explained. “I’ve been begging her to do it. It’s just been difficult for us. We actually conceived twice but lost the baby very early.”
I rubbed my cheek, feeling my numb skin. Pregnant? Esther had been pregnant twice, and she hadn’t told me anything? “Esther?” I said.
My sister stared at her palms. “You’ve been going through a tough time,” she said. “Your marriage wasn’t working, and then you were going through the divorce. I didn’t feel like I could burden you with it. And I didn’t think I could talk to you about it. All of this murder stuff . . .” She shook her head. “You’re so far away.”
If she had shoved a knife in my gut, I couldn’t have been more hurt. Or more surprised. I’d always thought I was close to Esther. No, I was close to Esther. We lived in the same town, and we talked every other day. We saw each other at Christmas. We did Sunday breakfast every other month. I’d had dinner here at least a dozen times in the last two years.