Sarah looked up and down the trail, as if checking for other hikers, but we were alone here.
“I didn’t mean to scare her. I just wanted to cut her off.” I almost let out a laugh, remembering her face, the O of her mouth. At first, it was wonderful, the rush of adrenaline, the joy of catching Sarah, of being the one in control, standing above her on the trail. But then her anger.
Nico, what are you doing here, you stupid bitch!
“Mom and Dad said she had to take me, or she couldn’t go. But she didn’t. She left me, like I knew she would. She always did whatever she wanted.” I moved my sneaker over the dusty trail, rolling a rock under my sole. I didn’t want to say it out loud, what I knew deep down, about myself.
That I hated Sarah.
I hated my own sister. And she hated me.
Something inside me had snapped that day, when she stood over me with the sweater. I was done. I was tired of always tiptoeing around her. It was always about Sarah, what she wanted. No one ever thought about me.
“I knew when she got home, she was going to make me lie for her, say she took me along. Or say that she never went. And she would get away with it too, with my help—because she always got away with everything.”
Sarah stood silently, just watching my face.
“She always got her way.” I looked out over the lake. “But not this time.”
Mom said you had to take me. You can’t go without me.
Nico. She faced me defiantly. Get the fuck out of my way. Move. Now.
Then it all happened so fast. “She went to go around me but I wouldn’t move. I just stood there.”
Move your fat ass!
“She went over to this side.” I stepped to the side of the trail where it dropped off by the lake, not too close. The jutting rocks and steep side below us, with only one length of rusty metal handrail between two posts, unchanged from four years ago.
She had sighed loudly, trying to push her bike around me. But I wouldn’t move. I stood, arms crossed. I had never stood up to her before. I had never defied her. I could tell she was confused, angry. This wasn’t the Nico that she knew. What did I think was going to happen? That she would say, “Nico, you’re totally right. Come with me. Come hang out with me and my boyfriend. You can watch us make out.”
Suddenly, she dropped the bike to hit me and I ducked. I stepped back and felt my right foot slide beneath me, over the edge, just a few inches from the end of the handrail. I turned, suddenly scrambling, falling, as the ground seemed to move from under me, rocks and dirt scraping as I slid. I looked up, reached over for the metal post of the railing just as I heard the sound of something hitting metal. It took me a moment to realize that it was the back of my own head. I blinked and saw blackness, heard a rushing in my ears.
Then silence.
“Nico!” I heard Sarah scream. It sounded so far away.
I tried to sit up, realizing too late that my legs were hanging over the side of the trail, over the lake hundreds of feet below. My head had luckily caught the post of the railing and had broken my fall, leaving my upper body still on the trail, but barely. I scooted back, clinging to the railing, my head throbbing. Next to me, I could see Sarah’s bike toppled, the wheel hanging over the edge. I felt the back of my head where the pain was the worst and found my hair was matted and wet. When I looked at my hand, my fingers were covered in blood. I gagged, crouching on my hands and knees. Now Sarah was going to be in trouble, real trouble. Mom and Dad couldn’t ignore this.
When I tried to stand, everything went in slow motion, and my vision swirled with black spots.
I held the rail and turned to look for Sarah. I couldn’t see her anywhere. She had left me, gone on to the picnic area to meet Max without me like I knew she would. I was alone. She had left me here, hurt and bleeding.
But she had also left her bike. That didn’t make sense. Why did she leave her bike?
My head was hurting so badly, I could barely keep my eyes open. I heard, from below me, over the edge, a sound of tumbling pebbles and sand. I glanced over the side of the trail and saw something light gray dangling from an exposed root about halfway down. Her sweater. A gentle breeze caught it, and it drifted, softly landing in the water far below without a sound. I watched it fall, cashmere, floating, like a soft, gray dove.
Her bike was on its side, the wheel still spinning round and round, tick-tick-tick. I watched as her sweater slowly darkened with water and then sank beneath the surface.
SARAH