My Sister's Keeper: A Novel Read online

  “Oh my God,” Kate says, sniffling. “Do you have any idea how much Serena and Preston have been through? Do you?”

  That fist inside me relaxes, now that I know it’s all right. Normal, in our house, is like a blanket too short for a bed—sometimes it covers you just fine, and other times it leaves you cold and shaking; and worst of all, you never know which of the two it’s going to be. I sit down on the end of Kate’s bed. Although I’m only thirteen, I’m taller than her and every now and then people mistakenly assume I’m the older sister. At different times this summer she has been crazy for Callahan, Wyatt, and Liam, the male leads on this soap. Now, I guess, it’s all about Preston. “There was the kidnapping scare,” I volunteer. I actually followed that story line; Kate made me tape the show during her dialysis sessions.

  “And the time she almost married his twin by mistake,” Kate adds.

  “Don’t forget when he died in the boat accident. For two months, anyway.” My mother joins the conversation, and I remember that she used to watch this soap, too, sitting with Kate in the hospital.

  For the first time, Kate seems to notice my mother’s outfit. “What are you wearing?”

  “Oh. Something I’m sending back.” She stands up in front of me so that I can undo her zipper. This mail-order compulsion, for any other mother, would be a wake-up call for therapy; for my mom, it would probably be considered a healthy break. I wonder if it’s putting on someone else’s skin for a while that she likes so much, or if it’s the option of being able to send back a circumstance that just doesn’t suit you. She looks at Kate, hard. “You’re sure nothing hurts?”

  After my mother leaves, Kate sinks a little. That’s the only way to describe it—how fast color drains from her face, how she disappears against the pillows. As she gets sicker, she fades a little more, until I am afraid one day I will wake up and not be able to see her at all. “Move,” Kate orders. “You’re blocking the picture.”

  So I go to sit on my own bed. “It’s only the coming attractions.”

  “Well, if I die tonight I want to know what I’m missing.”

  I fluff my pillows up under my head. Kate, as usual, has swapped so that she has all the funchy ones that don’t feel like rocks under your neck. She’s supposed to deserve this, because she’s three years older than me or because she’s sick or because the moon is in Aquarius—there’s always a reason. I squint at the television, wishing I could flip through the stations, knowing I don’t have a prayer. “Preston looks like he’s made out of plastic.”

  “Then why did I hear you whispering his name last night into your pillow?”

  “Shut up,” I say.

  “You shut up.” Then Kate smiles at me. “He probably is gay, though. Quite a waste, considering the Fitzgerald sisters are—” Wincing, she breaks off mid-sentence, and I roll toward her.

  “Kate?”

  She rubs her lower back. “It’s nothing.”

  It’s her kidneys. “Want me to get Mom?”

  “Not yet.” She reaches between our beds, which are just far apart enough for us to touch each other if we both try. I hold out my hand, too. When we were little we’d make this bridge and try to see how many Barbies we could get to balance on it.

  Lately, I have been having nightmares, where I’m cut into so many pieces that there isn’t enough of me to be put back together.

  • • •

  My father says that a fire will burn itself out, unless you open a window and give it fuel. I suppose that’s what I’m doing, when you get right down to it; but then again, my dad also says that when flames are licking at your heels you’ve got to break a wall or two if you want to escape. So when Kate falls asleep from her meds I take the leather binder I keep between my mattress and box spring and go into the bathroom for privacy. I know Kate’s been snooping—I rigged up a red thread between the zipper’s teeth to let me know who was prying into my stuff without my permission, but even though the thread’s been torn there’s nothing missing inside. I turn on the water in the bathtub so it sounds like I’m in there for a reason, and sit down on the floor to count.

  If you add in the twenty dollars from the pawnshop, I have $136.87. It’s not going to be enough, but there’s got to be a way around that. Jesse didn’t have $2,900 when he bought his beat-up Jeep, and the bank gave him some kind of loan. Of course, my parents had to sign the papers, too, and I doubt they’re going to be willing to do that for me, given the circumstances. I count the money a second time, just in case the bills have miraculously reproduced, but math is math and the total stays the same. And then I read the newspaper clippings.

  Campbell Alexander. It’s a stupid name, in my opinion. It sounds like a bar drink that costs too much, or a brokerage firm. But you can’t deny the man’s track record.

  To reach my brother’s room, you actually have to leave the house, which is exactly the way he likes it. When Jesse turned sixteen he moved into the attic over the garage—a perfect arrangement, since he didn’t want my parents to see what he was doing and my parents didn’t really want to see. Blocking the stairs to his place are four snow tires, a small wall of cartons, and an oak desk tipped onto its side. Sometimes I think Jesse sets up these obstacles himself, just to make getting to him more of a challenge.

  I crawl over the mess and up the stairs, which vibrate with the bass from Jesse’s stereo. It takes nearly five whole minutes before he hears me knocking. “What?” he snaps, opening the door a crack.

  “Can I come in?”

  He thinks twice, then steps back to let me enter. The room is a sea of dirty clothes and magazines and leftover Chinese take-out cartons; it smells like the sweaty tongue of a hockey skate. The only neat spot is the shelf where Jesse keeps his special collection—a Jaguar’s silver mascot, a Mercedes symbol, a Mustang’s horse—hood ornaments that he told me he just found lying around, although I’m not dumb enough to believe him.

  Don’t get me wrong—it isn’t that my parents don’t care about Jesse or whatever trouble he’s gotten himself mixed up in. It’s just that they don’t really have time to care about it, because it’s a problem somewhere lower on the totem pole.

  Jesse ignores me, going back to whatever he was doing on the far side of the mess. My attention is caught by a Crock-Pot—one that disappeared out of the kitchen a few months ago—which now sits on top of Jesse’s TV with a copper tube threaded out of its lid and down through a plastic milk jug filled with ice, emptying into a glass Mason jar. Jesse may be a borderline delinquent, but he’s brilliant. Just as I’m about to touch the contraption, Jesse turns around. “Hey!” He fairly flies over the couch to knock my hand away. “You’ll screw up the condensing coil.”

  “Is this what I think it is?”

  A nasty grin itches over his face. “Depends on what you think it is.” He jimmies out the Mason jar, so that liquid drips onto the carpet. “Have a taste.”

  For a still made out of spit and glue, it produces pretty potent moonshine whiskey. An inferno races so fast through my belly and legs I fall back onto the couch. “Disgusting,” I gasp.

  Jesse laughs and takes a swig, too, although for him it goes down easier. “So what do you want from me?”

  “How do you know I want something?”

  “Because no one comes up here on a social call,” he says, sitting on the arm of the couch. “And if it was something about Kate, you would’ve already told me.”

  “It is about Kate. Sort of.” I press the newspaper clippings into my brother’s hand; they’ll do a better job explaining than I ever could. He scans them, then looks me right in the eye. His are the palest shade of silver, so surprising that sometimes when he stares at you, you can completely forget what you were planning to say.

  “Don’t mess with the system, Anna,” he says bitterly. “We’ve all got our scripts down pat. Kate plays the Martyr. I’m the Lost Cause. And you, you’re the Peacekeeper.”

  He thinks he knows me, but that goes both ways—and when it comes to