The Sometime Sister by Katherine Nichols (ebook reader for comics .txt) 📕

Remember how quiet and still he got when we asked him why Aunt Rita stopped coming? And how he finally broke and told us it must have had something to do with the night his daddy disappeared? He’d heard Gran and our mothers arguing a few weeks after Uncle Roy left. His mother had said there were some things you could never forgive, but Lesroy didn’t know what they were and who couldn’t be forgiven for them.

I never forgot what he told us, but when I mentioned it to him last year, he acted like he didn’t remember it at all. That seemed strange because Lesroy never forgets anything. If you ever read this, you should ask him about those things that can never be forgiven.

The rest of her letter focused on how hard it was to fill the long days, but that she was at least making headway with Eva. The housekeeper had moved from tolerating her to enjoying her company. She hoped they might become real friends.

I wanted to dismiss my sister’s words as an attempt to make me feel sorry for her. But I kept seeing the little girl on the beach, sand flying as, desperate to keep up, she ran behind me and Lesroy. I walked to the balcony and stared below. From my vantage point, the people hustling and bustling all seemed to be going to some happy or important place. Or were they, too, trying to keep up with the ones they loved?

I realized I’d spent over thirty minutes on one letter. If I kept letting my emotions get in the way, I would never finish reading through the packets before my meeting with Ben. Even if I distanced myself from the lonely melody threaded throughout my sister’s words, it would take hours—hours I might not have, depending on how quickly Harry arranged things.

Time wasn’t the only problem. It was as if Stella was speaking to me as I read. She had a lovely voice, clear and strong, warmed with a gentle Southern drawl. For about half a minute, she considered a singing career but never pursued it. The realization I’d never hear her again filled me with a heaviness that threatened to suffocate me. I needed help.

Justin was the logical choice. Through his connection to Mike and his unholy alliance with my mother, he had some insight into my family. My instincts told me he wasn’t a cold-blooded killer. But they had also told me Ben would make a good husband, so there was that.

Cold-blooded killer or not, Justin McElroy was my best option for discovering clues hidden in Stella’s letters.

I called to explain what I needed, and he showed up in less than ten minutes. His wavy hair was damp from the shower, and he smelled like fresh-cut lemons.

“I really appreciate this. There are so many of them. I’m usually a fast reader and an excellent skimmer, but for some reason I keep getting bogged down.” My throat thickened as I ran out of reasons for my inefficiency.

“Not a problem,” he said, touching me lightly on the shoulder. He took the envelope marked July and picked up a highlighter I’d placed on the square glass-topped table near the window. “We’ve got at least three hours before dinner. Both of us will mark anything that looks helpful. Then we’ll trade letters.”

His plan helped me distance myself from Stella and her loneliness. Her voice faded as I read four remaining ones from June. It seemed she had made friends other than her housekeeper. She mentioned learning to surf and hanging out at several bars.

Despite my increased speed, Justin had already finished August and September when we stopped to review each other’s work. I’ve never been a very precise highlighter. Once I get started, I have trouble stopping. My system in college was complicated and clumsy. I used yellow for what would definitely be on the test, blue for what might be on the test, and green for stuff that would never be on the test but was kind of interesting. The bookstore never gave me any trade-in credit, and my roommate asked to document my biology book as data for a psychology paper she was writing on the connection between sociopathic behavior and OCD in women ages eighteen to twenty-five.

It was no surprise it took Justin almost as long to get through my June highlights as it did for me to read his July, August, and. September.

“Now we need to chart our ideas,” he said. “Note cards would be great, but we can fold and tear….”

Before he finished, I pulled a small packet from my bag and put it on the table in front of him.

“You scare me a little, Grace.” He took a few index cards and gave me back my letters. “Write down anything about people and places she mentions. Include any social stuff—parties, shopping trips, lunches, and any references to Ben. Add the month and letter number on the bottom.”

In less than ten minutes, we covered most of the bed. Eva’s stack was the thickest.

“Now we’ve got a pretty good idea about the beginning of Stella’s life in Montañita. Let’s work on the rest of her first year. Look for more info on the people and locations we marked and any new names and places. You’re better at picking up mood shifts in your sister, so mark those, too. But for God’s sake, go easy with the highlighter or we’ll never get through them.”

I worked on October and November while he took December through March. I breezed through until I hit Halloween, Stella’s favorite holiday. My sister loved being scared or pretending to be since she was fearless. She adored the excess of all the candy you could carry and intricate jack-o’-lantern carvings. She even enjoyed scooping pumpkin goo with her hands and squeezing the seeds out for Gran to bake.

But most of all, Stella was crazy for costumes. When