WRITTEN BY BHAGATH SUBRAMANIAN.
I. THE PURSE
Her motel room was strewn about with bags of clothes that she didn’t have the time to launder, her work uniform scattered across the floor, undone wrapping paper and strip mall shopping bags lost under the table.
However, she was pristine. She looked back down at her dress. It was black. The sleeves were long and ended in black frills. They covered her forearms. She liked that. It was a simple, plain dress. It didn’t feel like her. Or maybe, it was her, only just from a time that feels like a lifetime ago.
She grabbed her purse and went out the door before she changed her mind.
It was almost dark out. She clicked open her purse. Her fingers anxiously swooped past the cold metal of her revolver and fished out her bank card in a flash. The purse clicked shut.
“You got your hair cut.”
It was Paul at the reception tonight.
“You look different. Heading out?”
“Just a party. Housewarming, for my sister.”
Paul smiled. “I didn’t know you had a sister.”
“Thanks for the groceries. How much do I owe you?” she said. She placed her bank card on the countertop.
“C’mon, it’s just some eggs and bread,” said Paul. “Least I could do.”
“Thank you,” she said.
“Don’t mention it. It’s actually-“
“Could you call me a cab? I might be late.”
“Sure. Of course,” said Paul.
She turned away to smoke while he made the call. Then she remembered that her cigarettes were in her purse. She bit her lip, then turned back around. He put the phone down. The purse felt heavier.
Soon the cab arrived. She nodded a silent thank-you to Paul, and left.
The drive through the city was long and winding. She didn’t speak to the driver.
She held onto her purse even tighter and began to think about her sister.
II. THE SISTER
Eveline folded up the report. Her throat was dry. Coarse. She didn’t want to finish her lunch after reading those words. But what else did she expect? She took a deep breath.
She needed to clear her head.
“I’m going to go fix myself a mimosa, you want one?” she called out.
Her fiancé shook his head from the pool. He swam further away. She got up from her chair and went inside.
She walked into the kitchen and took her time with fixing the drink. She spent even longer stirring. She found herself lost, staring into the tiny orange vortex forming in the glass. Spiralling. She went into the living room and sat down onto the sofa and tucked her feet underneath her. She began to think about her sister. About that report. Her suspicions were true. Not a single day in rehab. She remembers when they spoke over the phone last month. She couldn’t recognise her sister’s voice anymore. Was that even her sister at this point? She asked to meet, but did she even want to meet a hollow husk of her sister?
What about her child?
Eveline stifled a sob. If not for her sister’s sake, then for the child. He was young enough. He wouldn’t remember a thing. She’d be saving him some trauma. He’d find himself a new family, one that was whole. One that could take care of him. Right?
As for her sister- what about her? She hadn’t seen the woman in years. She thought about the girls that they once were, and about the two very different women that they had become.
She sat on that couch for an hour with her drink untouched. All she knew was that she cried. After she had collected herself, she took a sip of the mimosa. She looked across the room, at the phone. No more cheques, no more out of the blue wire transfers. This was for the greater good, she told herself.
She finished her drink and walked over to the phone.
III. THE PENTHOUSE
The cab came to a stop at an apartment complex. It looked like it was made entirely of glass and shiny things. Dripping with opulence. She shrunk into her seat. Was this the place?
She paid the driver and made her way into the building.
Her sister lived right at the top. She’d never heard so many consecutive elevator dings in her life. She stepped out into a hallway that led straight to one door. Her purse grew heavier. Her palms began to sweat. She walked up to the door.
She knocked. The door swung open and-
“Come on in!” said a friendly face.
She didn’t know who this person was. She didn’t know who any of them were. It was a large party, a writhing swarm of people. A sea of faces that she couldn’t register. There were too many smiles. And she didn’t have one on.
“Would you like a drink?” one of them asked.
“No, thanks. Just water is fine.”
“How do you know Eveline? Did you work together? Or do you know her husband?” asked another.
She’s married? She didn’t know how to answer them. She tried to say something. But her eyes were darting off elsewhere. Across the room, she saw someone walking towards her.
It was Eveline, looking as delicate as porcelain.
She stared at her face.
Eveline smiled-
And walked past. She didn’t recognise her.
She watched as her sister made her way through the crowd, giving everyone the same smile. Her sister went to a tray of devilled eggs on the counter.
She watched her say charming things. She watched the people around her laugh. She watched her laugh. She watched her pick up a flute of champagne and sip on it with her strawberry lips.
And then she thought about the child that was dragged away from her, her baby. She thought of the woman that stopped responding to her calls. The woman that left her. The woman that left her with nothing.
She watched Eveline, and opened her purse. She wrapped her fingers around revolver’s cold grip and felt her rage warm up the metal. She saw herself walking up to her dear sister, and shoving the barrel in between her eyes before squeezing a round into the chasm that forgot her face.
She would kill her sister. Right there.
Her fingers graced the trigger, her thumb on the hammer when-
She heard crying, a child’s crying.
She kept her hand in the purse.
Eveline began to look around. And there it was, a small toddler, no older than three. A boy no bigger than her own son, the last time she saw him. She watched her sister pick the child up, and disappear into a hallway. She sat down. She needed to clear her head. She looked around, and saw only flutes of champagne. The room began to spin. She saw her sister return. She scrambled to leave the party, but the moment she got up, she felt sick. She slipped past her sister into the empty house.
IV. THE CHILD
She splashed cold water onto her face. The spots in her vision were beginning to clear up. She managed to hold down the contents of her stomach, albeit with much difficulty.
She wanted leave immediately, to get a cab, and go back to the motel. And to get rid of the piece.
She could walk out of the bathroom and forget her sister. Whatever this was, whatever she wanted out of tonight, she decided that it wasn’t for her. She wiped her face with a soft white towel, and stepped outside.
No one was in this part of the house. It was empty. This hallway was silent.
She stopped. She looked down the hallway, past the ornate furniture and into the master bedroom. She looked past the queen size bed and into the open balcony.
There she saw the toddler, playing. It was clumsy, stupid and full of curiosity, just like any child.
She stood there and watched, unmoving.
She saw a pigeon land on the railing. She watched the curious child and felt no need to move. She watched the child reach up with its little hands, and crawl onto a small box. He reached up towards the bird, which began to scoot further down the railing, away from the child. The child propped one leg onto the railing, and tried to balance itself as it reached for the bird. She watched the bird fly away, and she watched the child reach out for the bird.
She saw the child disappear over the edge. She did not move.
The hallway was silent.
Cover photograph by Bhagath Subramanian.
© Bhagath Subramanian. All rights reserved.