My sister hasnt spoken to me in eight years. Then, this Saturday, she rang as if nothing had ever happened and asked me for money for an operation.
For eight years, not a word from her, and now she calls out of the blue. If anyone had told me that one sentence over the phone could hurt more than eight years of silence, I would have laughed.
And then, just as I did on Saturday, Id have found myself sitting on the kitchen floor in tears, the phone in one hand and a tea towel in the other.
My sister, Margaret, is four years older than me. When we were girls, we shared a room in our little house in Reading.
In the evenings, while Dad watched football and Mum was ironing in the kitchen, we would whisper to each other about everything and nothing. That wed live together in a huge house one day. That wed never argue. I was ten years old and I truly believed it.
Ive worked in the Council offices for twenty-three years. My life runs to a schedule it must, or Id lose my mind.
Dad fell ill nine years ago. Lung cancertwo years of chemo, hospital visits, nights spent by his bedside. Margaret came to see him three times. The first time, she only stayed two hoursshe had to rush back, something to do with the dog, or the kitchen renovations, or something else.
I took time off, traded shifts with colleagues and never complained. I fed Dad, washed him, took him to his radiotherapy appointments. Thats what you doits your dad.
After he passed away, I discovered that, the year beforewhen he could barely get out of bedMum had persuaded him to sign the house over to Margaret. Proper will, everything legal.
Mum insisted it was fair, since Margarets circumstances were harder. Margaret, who visited three times. Margaret, who didnt wash a single plate. Margaret, who never even asked what tablets Dad was taking.
I tried to talk. With Mum, with Margaret, with both. Mum kept saying, Dont quarrel, your father wouldnt want that. Margaret just shrugged. It was his decision, she said, looking anywhere but at me, as though I was a window to something more interesting beyond.
Within six months, Margaret sold Dads house and bought herself a place outside Oxford, complete with a garden and a garage. Then she stopped taking my calls. She didnt turn up to my fiftieth birthday.
At Mums funeral, four years ago, we stood on opposite sides of the grave and avoided each others eyes. Someone in the family muttered, Shame Arthur isnt around to see this. He was right. Dad wouldnt have coped.
Eight years without a word. Eight Christmases with a spare plate on the tableMums tradition, then I carried it on for habits sake. Eight years getting used to the thought I no longer had a sister.
Then Saturday arrived.
I was washing up after lunch. My husband, Steve, was watching the news, and our son phoned to say hed bring little Sophie round on Sunday. Just an ordinary day. Then the phone rang. The name flashed on the screenone Id never deleted, though Im not sure why.
Rachel? Its me, Margaret.
Her voice sounded nothing like I rememberedthinner, a bit frail, or perhaps just rusty from lack of use.
I simply said, Im listening. Nothing else. What was there to say?
Margaret spoke quickly, barely pausing for breath, as if frightened Id hang up. Something about her knee giving her trouble, that the NHS waiting list is two years, but privately the operation is £3,500; that her husband left three years ago, the house swallows all her money, she has no one else to turn to. That Im her sister.
Im your sister, she repeated, as if shed only just realised it this moment after those eight years.
I stood by the sink, hands wet, and felt everything inside me turn to stone. All those years I had slowly poured concrete around myself, just so I wouldnt fall apart.
Margaret, I said calmly. You havent called in eight years, not even to check if Im still alive. I really dont know what to say to you now.
But its for the operation, Rachel. I can barely walk.
Im sorry, but I cant help you.
Silence. A thick, drawn-out silence, one where you can hear the others breathing and the rush of your own blood.
Then Margaret said it. Slowly, deliberately, as if shed planned the line.
You know, Dad was right. He always said you were a cold, heartless woman. And he was right.
Dad never said that. I know it. I was there, every day, for two years. I know every one of his words, every pained smile, every time I brought him tea with lemonhis favourite. Dad would never have said that.
But Margaret knew where to aim. She knew that bringing Dad into it would hit me like a knife between the ribs. Dads gone and cant defend me. And a drop of doubt will always remaindid he ever, perhaps, say something like that long ago, just to her?
I hung up. Slumped to the floor. Tea towel in one hand, phone in the other. Steve poked his head round the door, saw me, and just sat down beside me. Didnt askhe knows by now, after thirty years, when to speak and when just to be there.
We sat there for a good twenty minutes. I thought about Dad, about Mum, about the Margaret Id once shared a room with, that little girl promising me wed live together. I thought about how eight years of silence was painful, but at least it was honest. Silence says, I dont want to know you. But those wordsthose words were poisonous. Shed taken the man we both loved and used him as ammunition.
I havent called her back. I dont know if I ever will.
All I know is that on Sunday, when my granddaughter Sophie ran into the kitchen and asked, Grandma, are you making pancakes?I felt something Margaret will probably never understand. I realised I had a home that could never be taken from me or signed away. And that Dad would have smiled.
Not because he was proved right, but because hed know I never let him down.
