When She Was Me

by Marlee Bush

Our mother leaning over the bed, a knife in her hand. Our father’s lifeless broken body beneath her. I open my eyes. See my sister. “I’m not evil like her.” “She wasn’t evil.”

“She killed our father. Could have killed us too if we didn’t get away.”

The memories run together and converge. A blowout fight between them in our living room. Our mother screaming and clawing at him like a rabid animal. How could you do this? How could you do this to our family?

She hated us. She killed him, and then she just left us.”

Sarah doesn’t have social media.

is Sarah their mom?

Once it’s taken, I upload it to a search engine and run a reverse image search, expecting nothing, really. Then the screen loads. And I realize I’m no longer the only liar.

“Why are you defending her? She’s a liar! She’s lied to our faces, to everyone. Who knows what she’s capable of?” “And we’re not?” The words slip out before I can stop them. “We’re not liars too?” “That’s different.”

No it's not

My breath rushes out, and I can’t say words. At least none that would help because I can’t face the answer to her question myself. It all comes back to that night. Lenora made a choice, and so did I. Both had permanent consequences. Sometimes when I lie awake at night, I think of that night and how my choice affected hers. How different things might have been had I chosen differently.

“I’m trying.” Her voice is as splintered as mine. As desperate. “I just want to know more. Just a little more, and I’ll be able to move on. I’ll be able to leave it behind us, Cassie.”

Lenora’s eyes don’t waver from mine. “I can’t lose you too,” I say. “I promise, Cassie.”

“You’re wrong, you know. She left me before. She left me, and it ruined everything.”

“Yes, you do, Sandra,

“They haunt us. The ones we run from. They hurt us every day without ever being here.”

“The person who destroyed my entire family.” And I remember the article. The house fire that killed Sandra Wells’s family the night she went missing.

That’s why I expected to feel her more. Every moment. Every breath. Every phantom pain. I wonder if Cassie is feeling it.

Because that night she ran, and I stayed, and both our lives changed forever. But she came back. That has to mean something.

Mom used to say we’d leave the world the same way we entered it. When I entered the world, there was only Cassie, and I intend to leave it the same way. Even if that means leaving tonight.

I was wrong. So very wrong. “Run, Lenora,” she says.

But it isn’t a question. Not really. Mom is lying sideways across her bed. A knife sticks from her chest, but there’s so much blood—over her, on her sheets. So much, I can’t gauge the extent of her injuries. And that’s when I see you. I realize the wetness I felt on you isn’t sweat. No, you’re covered in blood too. I bring my hands to my face and stumble back. Red. So much red.

But I see you now, the way your eyes roam over her body and Mom’s. Even I can see the flash of pleasure, the flash of pride. The lack of remorse. I stand quickly and grab your face, streaking your chin with our mother’s blood. “Why do you keep doing this? Why would you do this to us? We were about to leave. It was all about to be over!”

“I know it’s wrong, but I liked it. Ever since Kate.”

Jesus are both of the sisters just completely fucked

A roaring in my ears. “So you told me he was abusing you?”

WTF

“You still love me, don’t you, Sandra?”

Emily,

WTF is Emily

We pull the knife from Mom’s chest. Drag Monica to your bed. Then we do what we do best. We start a fire.

“My younger sister. Emily,” Sarah says, stepping in front of the woman. Then I remember the article. Sarah when she was Sandra. An escape from a house fire. A dead sister who clearly didn’t die.

“It was you,” I say to Emily.

“None of this was supposed to happen,” Sarah emphasizes through her teeth. “It was all an accident. A big misunderstanding.” “You weren’t supposed to drag me down here and tie me up?” Cassie asks sarcastically. “I guess I accidently fell into these zip ties.”

“I kept Emily in that room for her own good and yours. I didn’t know she was able to get out. I never would have put her in there had I known,” Sarah explains. Emily is looking at her sister, and I can’t quite tell what she’s thinking.

My intake of breath is audible, and everything finally makes sense. “Your sister killed Tilly.”

Damn sorry Lenora I was a bitch to you

We don’t speak. There are no words exchanged because we’re both on the same wavelength. “Hit her again,” I say, wiping my mouth with the back of my arm. All I taste is blood.

After Kate, Mom, and Monica, I still believed you. Still believed you were good. And things were great for a while. I started working at that restaurant in San Antonio. You got a job at that juice place downtown.

The then was Sandra and Emily DAMN

They even connected Sarah and her sister to another house fire in their hometown that killed another young woman. Kate Wellesley.