Chapter 13 - THE SISTER AT THE DOOR
Caroline did not let Emily into the office.
She asked security to escort her outside.
Emily refused.
So I made a decision everyone hated.
“I’ll speak to her.”
Mom shook her head.
“No.”
Caroline looked concerned.
“You are under no obligation.”
“I know.”
I wheeled toward the elevator.
“I’m still going.”
We met in the lobby.
Emily stood near the glass doors.
She wore sunglasses.
Her hair was pulled into a rough ponytail.
For once, she did not look perfect.
She looked exhausted.
When she saw Mom behind me, her mouth tightened.
“You brought the records.”
Mom said nothing.
Emily looked at me.
“You believe her?”
“I believe documents.”
She laughed bitterly.
“You sound like your lawyer.”
“Good.”
She removed the sunglasses.
Her eyes were swollen.
“Daniel blocked me.”
I waited.
“He told me not to contact his mother either.”
Still I said nothing.
Emily crossed her arms.
“Aren’t you going to say you’re sorry?”
“For what?”
“For what happened.”
“You mean the consequences?”
Her face hardened.
“This is why people think you’re cold.”
I almost smiled.
“Which people?”
She realized her mistake.
The imaginary audience she had spent years building around herself was disappearing.
“Emily.”
“What?”
“Did you tell Mom you wished I had stayed outside during the fire?”
Her face changed.
She looked at Mom.
“Of course you told her.”
“Did you say it?”
“I was angry.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
Emily’s chin lifted.
“Yes.”
The word hurt.
But not as much as I expected.
Maybe there was a limit to how many times a person could break the same piece of your heart.
“Why?”
“Because I’m tired.”
“Of what?”
“Of that night deciding everything.”
I stared at her.
“You think I chose that?”
“No.”
“But you turned it into your identity.”
I almost could not believe her.
“My identity?”
“The scars.”
“The chair.”
“The survivor groups.”
“The articles.”
“You act like the fire is still happening.”
My voice became quiet.
“Sometimes it is.”
She stopped.
I touched the scar along my jaw.
“Every time this skin contracts.”
“Every time I need another procedure.”
“Every time a stranger asks what happened.”
“Every time I wake up smelling smoke that isn’t there.”
“The fire is still happening.”
Emily looked away.
“But I never asked you to live inside it with me.”
She said nothing.
“I never asked you to apologize for surviving.”
“I never asked you to make your wedding about me.”
“I came wearing long sleeves in September because Mom said you were worried about photographs.”
Her head snapped toward our mother.
Mom looked ashamed.
I continued.
“I covered myself for you.”
“I positioned my wheelchair away from the aisle for you.”
“And it still wasn’t enough.”
Emily’s eyes filled.
“I wanted one perfect day.”
“There are no perfect days.”
“No perfect families.”
“No perfect faces.”
“There are just people.”
“And what you do to them when they ruin the picture you imagined.”
She began crying.
“I lost Daniel.”
“I know.”
“My friends won’t talk to me.”
“I know.”
“People are posting things online.”
“I haven’t posted anything.”
“I know.”
That answer surprised me.
She wiped her face.
“I keep waiting for you to destroy me.”
I looked at her.
“I don’t want to destroy you.”
“Then stop the lawsuit.”
“No.”
Her face hardened again instantly.
There it was.
Her grief had conditions.
“Then you do want revenge.”
“No.”
“I want what belongs to me accounted for.”
“I want legal boundaries.”
“And I want you to stop confusing forgiveness with immunity.”
Emily stared at me.
Security waited near the doors.
Finally, she whispered.
“Do you hate me?”
The question stopped me.
I thought about the ten-year-old under the burning curtain.
The teenager who once slept beside my hospital bed.
The young woman who cropped me out of photos.
The bride who asked me to hide.
“I don’t know.”
Emily flinched.
I continued.
“But I know I cannot love you the way I used to.”
She looked as if I had struck her.
That was the first consequence she truly understood.
She put her sunglasses back on.
Then she walked out.
Three hours later, Caroline received an email from Patrick Hale.
Emily had fired him.
She was representing herself.
Caroline stared at the message.
“That is rarely a good sign.”
May you like
She was right.
Because that night, Emily finally posted my name.
