How was it that no one was certain Sister Reliability would return home after her very own adoptive brother passed away? I might have been a monster, but not that kind of monster. It hurt me a little, that my adoptive parents were not expecting me, that they were so astonished by my arrival, that they seemed scandalized by my suitcase, by the mere suggestion that I would be staying a few nights with them in my childhood home. I supposed if they themselves had called me, I would have been able to tell them my travel arrangements. Instead a stranger called me, a relative I hadn’t spoken with in years, a relative I saw last at a great-aunt’s funeral I was forced to attend when I was in fifth grade. Uncle Geoff who once refused to own a phone! I don’t think he was even my real uncle! He was probably a second cousin twice removed!! How avoidant they are! I thought. They couldn’t bring themselves to tell their own adoptive daughter her adoptive brother was dead, the person she grew up with, the one she was forced to take baths with, tepid baths before he was toilet-trained, the one who pissed in the bath while she, the adoptive sister, sat calmly in a tub filled with a combination of tepid water and his urine, they didn’t have the mental and emotional strength to tell her that he was gone, and not only was he gone, he did it to himself.
At first I wasn’t upset that I had heard the news from Uncle Geoff, but now that my adoptive parents were standing right before me, I wanted to scream at them for subjecting me to such a senseless phone call from a stranger, the type of phone call that causes the brain to work so hard, the brain comes apart like pieces of dried-up clay and the next minute all one can see is a screen of flat, broken-down boxes, no more thought-secretions oozing out like toxic slime. My adoptive parents continued whispering to each other. Or maybe I heard the sound of the wind moving the tops of the trees around and the raindrops pelting the leaves and branches.
After all these years, she’s just going to show up. Has Helen gone mad? I swore I heard them say.
No, it’s the rain, I said gently, calmly. Haven’t you two noticed we’re in the midst of a terrible rainstorm?
Your mother and I can see that, said my adoptive father as they stood in the door frame.
They continued to stand in the door frame as the wind blew the rain through the open door. I made a note to myself that they had not greeted me with a plate of cookies and milk, not even tea and stale muffins, as I had pictured. Then I forced my way into the house because I was certain my adoptive parents were too astonished by my sudden appearance to invite me in.
Where do you keep the mop? I said.
My adoptive parents’ mouths opened even wider and I saw the ugly fillings in their teeth, mostly silver and a few gold caps and some white sealants.
The mop, I demanded. And a bucket. Can’t you see the floor is soaking wet? You have almost an inch of standing water here.
My adoptive mother pointed with a trembling finger in the direction of the utility closet down the hall next to the laundry room, and I went about making myself useful, mopping up the rain with broad, sweeping gestures and then wringing out the rain with all of my brute strength.
I could kill a dog with a brick! I shouted to no one when I was done.
After I finished mopping up the rain that had pooled in the foyer of my childhood home, after I went upstairs and threw open all of my bedroom windows to air out the stench of death, after I looked around my simple childhood bedroom, the most elegant room in the house because of its simplicity and lack of decorative knickknacks, after I emptied the contents of my canvas suitcase onto the carpeted floor, and changed out of my soaking-wet clothes into a gray, worn-at-the-elbows terrycloth bathrobe without a belt, I made my way downstairs where I knew my adoptive parents were waiting for me.
6
I felt a sense of vertigo as I went down the staircase, like I was traveling into an abyss.
Once I reached the living room, my equilibrium was only slightly restored. The room was brightly lit, overcompensating for the dark-wood-beamed ceiling and the dark orange wallpaper. No one liked the dark orange wallpaper, but they were too cheap to fix it. It was like looking at a movie screen with a flickering hair. After a moment, my eyes adjusted.
My adoptive parents motioned for me to sit down on a three-person-length wicker-basket couch in the living room, ostensibly to discuss the odd circumstances surrounding the death of my adoptive brother. My adoptive father sat on the couch with me, and my adoptive mother sat in a wicker-basket chair opposite the couch.
Where did all of this wicker furniture come from? I said to them as I looked around.
It was on sale, said my adoptive mother. It’s easier to keep clean than the leather.
But besides that, not much has changed, said my adoptive father. You see Helen, all we did was replace the leather with the wicker.
The furniture was exactly the same, just of a different material and texture. The same family photographs and knickknacks graced the fireplace mantel, the stereo and speakers were set back in a black cabinet with a clear plastic door that, when pressed, swung open, and in the corner of the room was a smug and self-satisfied beanbag chair that the long-dead family dog used to sleep upon. I was shocked my adoptive parents had kept that beanbag chair all those years.
Who sits on that? I said to my adoptive parents.
That was Bailey’s bed, said my adoptive mother, and she had a faraway, dreamy look in her eyes.
As soon as we clarified the matter of the new furniture, my adoptive mother, in her to-the-floor flannel nightgown, got up. Does anyone want some herbal tea? she said. I’m going to make some herbal tea.
She went into the kitchen and busied herself for a while and I heard her opening and closing the wood cabinets absentmindedly.