Chapter 9: The Conversation Rachel and I Still Had to Have
She called in December.
A Sunday afternoon, when the light came through my kitchen window at a low winter angle and Chloe was in her room reading.
I almost didn't answer.
But I had told our mother that Rachel could call me herself.
And she had.
"Hi," Rachel said.
"Hi."
A long pause.
I waited.
"I'm not going to ask you to forgive me," she said.
"I know that's not — I know I don't get to ask for that."
"Okay."
"I just wanted to say it.
What I said about Chloe." Her voice was careful and controlled, but underneath it was something raw that I hadn't heard from her in a very long time, maybe ever.
"I've been trying to find the right words for two months and I don't think there are any.
But I need you to know that I know it was wrong.
Not just wrong.
It was cruel.
She's a child.
She's your child.
And I stood in front of three hundred people and I said that about her."
I didn't say anything.
"I was trying to hurt you," Rachel said.
"I know that's not an excuse.
I was angry and I wanted to hurt you and I used her to do it.
And she didn't deserve that.
She deserved the opposite of that."
"Yes," I said.
"She did."
"Is she—" Rachel stopped.
"Is she okay?"
"She's fine.
She's resilient." I paused.
"She asked about you."
A silence.
"She did?"
"She wanted to know if you were okay." I looked out the window at the winter yard.
"She's eight.
She doesn't carry things the way we do."
Rachel was quiet for a long time.
When she spoke again, her voice was smaller.
"I don't know how to be different," she said.
"I've been thinking about that.
I've been in therapy since October and I keep — I keep coming back to the fact that I don't actually know how to be different.
I only know how to manage things.
Control things.
Make sure everything goes the way I need it to go."
"I know."
"I did it to Dad," she said.
"When I was sixteen.
Mom told me she told you."
"Yes."
"I told myself for years that I did it to protect Mom.
That I was protecting the family." A breath.
"But I was sixteen and I was angry and I wanted him gone.
And I used what I found to make that happen.
And then I spent the next twenty years pretending I'd done the right thing."
I sat down at the kitchen table.
"Rachel," I said.
"I'm not going to tell you it's all right.
It's not all right.
What you did to Andrew's business.
What you said to Chloe.
What you did to Dad.
None of it is all right."
"I know."
"But I'm also not going to spend the rest of my life being at war with you." I looked at the table.
"I'm tired.
I've been tired for a long time.
And Chloe doesn't need to grow up watching her mother and her aunt hate each other."
"What does that mean?" Rachel said carefully.
"It means I'm not ready to pretend nothing happened.
But I'm also not closing the door." I paused.
"It means if you want to be different, you have to actually be different.
Not just say it."
"Okay," she said.
Very quietly.
"And you need to apologize to Chloe.
Not through me.
Directly.
When she's ready and when I decide it's appropriate.
But it has to happen."
"Yes." No hesitation.
"Yes.
Whatever she needs.
Whatever you decide."
We stayed on the line a little longer.
Not talking about much.
The weather.
A book our mother had recommended.
Small, ordinary things that felt strange and also necessary.
When we hung up, I sat at the table for a while.
Chloe appeared in the doorway in her socks, book in hand.
"Was that Aunt Rachel?"
"Yes."
She considered this.
"Is she going to be okay?"
"I think she's trying to be."
Chloe nodded, apparently satisfied.
She padded back down the hallway.
I got up and made dinner.
Set two plates on the table.
May you like
Called Chloe when it was ready.
She came running.
