Half-Life of a Stolen Sister

ALSO BY THE AUTHOR

A Highly Unlikely Scenario

Good on Paper

Copyright © 2023 by Rachel Cantor

All rights reserved.

Excerpt from The Uses of Doubt by Stacey D’Erasmo, copyright © 2002 by Stacey D’Erasmo. Used by permission of the author. All rights reserved.

Published by

Soho Press, Inc.

227 W 17th Street

New York, NY 10011

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Cantor, Rachel, author.

Half-life of a stolen sister / Rachel Cantor.

New York, NY : Soho Press, [2023]

Identifiers: LCCN 2022058936 |

ISBN 978-1-64129-464-5

eISBN 978-1-64129-465-2

Subjects: LCGFT: Novels.

Classification: LCC PS3603.A5877 H35 2023 | DDC 813'.6—dc23/eng/20221209

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022058936

Printed in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For my brothers and sisters, with love

This present moment had no pain, no blot, no want; full, pure, perfect, it deeply blessed me.

—Lucy Snowe, Villette

Writing, by contrast, is filled with the shame of visibility, of singularity, of the exposure of one’s desire for recognition and love and existence. Writing, indeed, is the very sign of desire itself: it asks to be read. It is filled with the desire and the willingness to be known.

—from The Uses of Doubt by Stacey D’Erasmo

LITTLE MOTHER—

in which a mother dies (as recounted by Maria)

Mama teaches the difference between us.

The pillows are all behind her. Around her, left to right: Branny, the closest because he’s the Only Boy; Lotte, jostling with Bran, who’s younger by a year but bigger; Em on the end, sucking her thumb; on the right, standing, Liza, holding a broom; and me, holding Annie, who sleeps with a sucker.

Annie, she says, you will always be the baby. No matter what you do, your family will love and underestimate you.

Annie opens her eyes, drops her sucker.

Emily, you will always care more for places than people. You will go away, but you will always come back.

Em puts a blanket over her head.

Branwell, you will try with your big heart to please, but until you learn self-control, you will only disappoint.

Branny whoops and throws a soldier to the air.

Charlotte, you care most for what you do not have; learn to care for what you have, and you will be happy.

But, Lotte says (she wants so much to understand!).

Elizabeth, your needs are simple; you will be forgotten, but you do not mind.

Liza holds her broom to her chest.

Maria. Are you there? Come closer, Maria.

I lay Annie onto the bed. She crawls to Em under the blanket.

I do not need to tell you who you are: you already know. You are the Little Mother, the one who fills the spaces.

I know this. I help Mama to lift a hand to my young face.

Because Mama is poorly she no longer: makes sockdolls, cooks cabbage, buttons dresses, shouts to Branny to stop pinching, counts the teeth Liza has lost, tugs at her pinafore, chews her nails, hums music by the dishes, explains puppets, says Scoot, makes faces at Annie, makes Lotte’s little braids, makes anyone guess what’s for dinner, says poems at the fire, calms Papa, a hand in his hair.

Lotte shakes the door and shouts. She draws pictures of happy Mama, happy Lotte, in crayoned blue and red. She slides them under the door; she tries to slide a cookie, a sockdoll.

I am eight so I’m the oldest: I yank Lotte away. But Lotte is strong. Strong with fear.

She shouts: Mama needs a doll from me!

She shouts: No, Maria. No!

Children, please!

Lotte wails by the water pot, placed there, before Mama’s room, for the event of fire. Branny throws soldiers, Emmy won’t nap, Annie crawls too near the stove, Liza scorches the sheets. Papa looks horrified—at all of it. He cannot read the paper for all the noise. I read to him. He shuts his eyes, his hands covering his face.

Auntie keeps saying, This isn’t how we do things.

Mama teaches us what brings us together. You are one person, she says: you have one heart, one mind, one body. If one of you fails, all of you fail; if one exults, everyone exults; if one dies, you all die. It cannot be otherwise. You can live without me, you can live without Papa, but you cannot live without each other. Remember this. Emily, do you remember? Bran? Lotte?

Mama, let me get you ice chips.

No, Maria, she says. This is important. Lotte, do you remember? Liza?

Before she got sick, Mama braided my hair; she called me Beauty and sang me songs. We are both Maria: Mama Maria, and me. But now she’s lost all reason, Papa says. Her eyeballs roll in her head and she sweats. Paddy, she says, the world is leaving me! Paddy, I am too young to die! Paddy, I fear there will be nothing after this, how can there be, if this is everything? Paddy, why won’t you hold me? Make love to me, Paddy, I am still here, I am still here!

A Little Mother does everything the mother does, but less. She does what she can. Lotte is only five. She has feelings, so I hold her.

I take Bran to the park so he can run. I tell him to throw a hundred stones into the lake. He throws as hard as he can, he makes a lot of noise, sometimes he says a bad word. He can’t count as high as one hundred, but when he gets tired I say, That’s a hundred, and he’s glad.

I take Em to the pound. She gives the dogs names and brings them treats. They climb on her face, which makes her laugh. If she laughs, she doesn’t have nightmares. If she has nightmares more than twice, I take her to see the dogs.

Liza’s nearly seven. She needs to talk. I ask her questions, about anything—the weather, what do we do to make Papa happy, is it time for washing. It doesn’t matter. When Mama got sick, Liza didn’t talk for a month; no one noticed but me.

The baby doesn’t know anything. She needs to play. I tell the others that Annie must never be sad, we must never let Annie be sad. Everyone has to make faces at baby, everyone must play games. Ring Around the Rosie, clapping games. Annie laughs. Babies need to laugh.

Mama has stopped saying she’s too young to die. She’s stopped pinching her cheeks for Papa and telling us about ourselves. I thought I understood time, she murmurs as I sop her face, but I was wrong. Pain makes each moment huge, as does relief, yet a moment is still the smallest thing we have. I want more moments, she says. I want life, I want moments, I want time! But the vastness calls me, Maria. Forgive me! You must forgive me! I am so tired.

I am tired, too.

Liza and Lotte hide in the closet, wearing Mama’s dresses and passing tea. The dresses have names we have mostly forgotten. Muslin, velvet, cocktail, other things. Auntie lets down the hems and gives them to the poor. Auntie arrived when Mama got sick. She’s here now till school starts, then she’s away. Who shall take care of them when I have gone? she asks. Paddy? Paddy? Aunt doesn’t wear dresses with names, just good dresses, serviceable dresses.

Inside the shoes you see where Mama’s toes stood. Now poor people wear Mama’s pumps, her flats and mules.

The big bed where Mama died is gone, there’s just a desk now so Papa can work, finally. Her body is with science but the important part of her’s in heaven. Papa says it’s time to forget. Aunt says, There’s baloney sandwiches. Em says, I don’t like baloney, Aunt says, Be grateful for protein.

Aunt makes sure we go to sleep and get up at the same time so we can have order. She makes meals and sews, but Aunt isn’t a Little Mother. She knows what children should become, which is little ladies and gentlemen; I know what we need now. We need to be together. I keep us together. I tell stories. About how Bran will buy us a Haworthy House worthy of the name. With six wings, servants, and pheasant for tea. Where we will have beautiful weddings with handsome swains and dresses with trains, and gossamer veils and tulips to throw.

The stories are how we know who we are, with no one left to tell us.

I will care for all the children, I say, in our Haworthy House. Everyone’s children!

I’d like a garden, whispers Liza.

Ye shall have a garden.

I want a zoo! declares Em.

Ye shall have a zoo.

It’s bags of gold for me! says Bran.

Bags ye shall have, say I.

Annie wants lovely toys, don’t ye, Annie?

. . .

What do you want, little Lotte?

Lotte bursts into tears. I want all of it to be true, she sobs. I want all of it to be true!

We are all around her, left to right: Bran, Em, Liza, Lotte, Annabelle, and me. I hold Mama’s hand but she doesn’t squeeze. Branwell does a dance, Em gives her a flower, but she doesn’t see. She looks at the ceiling. Her lips move, but she has no words.

She is a gorgon now, spitting and choking. No one has washed her hair. She would have turned the others to stone, so I sit with her, in her room, kept dark for sleeping, for not arousing love for the world. I say, It’s okay, Mama, it’s okay. She grabs my arm but I cannot hear what she says. She chokes again, and gasps and shakes her head and dies.

Her face is white, her mouth twists, her eyes are open. She is not at peace!

Papa said there would be peace! I try smoothing her hair. I try patting her cheek as she might pat mine. I say, There, there, and think, Maybe she is there, holding on! Maybe she doesn’t want to go! I don’t want her to go!

I look for stories to tell her about this world, to help her stay:

Liza is in the kitchen peeling potatoes, I say. She is wearing a shortish frock. Aunt says it’s too short, she’ll let down the hem soonest.

I say: Annie’s with Liza, maybe in her chair Papa found on the street. Can you hear?

Her face doesn’t move, it’s in agony!

If she goes, I want to be with her! There can be no Little Mother without Mother: we are one thing: if one of us dies, we both must die. I tie my wrist to hers. I use the elastic from my hair, I use two of them. To get close so our wrists can be tied, I go under the covers. Mama’s hip bone is sharp, her ribs are only a rack of bone, there is no softness where I can rest.

If I tell her about us, maybe she can hold on, she can hold on to me and not let go.

I whisper so only she can hear.

I say: Lotte and Bran are talking in their bunks, can you hear? Bran is dropping bombs; Lotte is getting cross. Lunch, Auntie cries and the furniture shakes.

Kerblew, kerblew, Branny cries, the world is ending, the world is over.

Lotte says, Don’t be stupid, penguin, it’s all just as it ever was.

HUNT FOR MYSTERIOUS CARP—

in which children play

Okay, this is the thicket of wild woods that encircles the glass castle of the evil Lord

Right, and there are lots of poisonous berries

And wild boar

The three loyalist spies will have to be careful

I don’t remember the spies

The spies sabotage the designs of the evil Lord and divert his attention from the rebels

Who are trying to reestablish the just and splendid reign of the Freiburg-Bonaparte dynasty

The spies are brave knights sons of the noblest in the land now imprisoned masquerading as mere laborers wearing rough-hewn clothes of flax

We need names

I’m Boron the Bold

Boron sounds like Moron moron

I am Bogomil the Bold

I am Elfron the Enigmatic

Rider is Rider

Rider can’t play no dogs in Glass Town

He’ll be quiet

He’s never quiet

If he barks Aunt will make us stop

He won’t bark

You always say that

GLASS TOWN: DRAMATIS PERSONAE

ROYAL MENAGERIE: Porky Porcupine, four flying horses, one Black Stallion named Buster, enough monkeys to fill one large tree, six talking squirrels: Frosty, Peculiar Eddy, Bambam, Tail of Woe, Mrs. Tail of Woe, Cheesecake

MENAGERIE ATTENDANTS: Quillmasters, Horse Traders, Monkey Shiners, Squirrel Grooms

COURT ENTERTAINERS: jongleurs, jugglers, jokers, jesters, jumblers, four genuine Genii

BEAUTIFUL LADIES: Lady Letitia Lambikin, Lady Renata Ramekin, Loretta the Galley Slave

What are you children doing?

Just playing a game Aunt

It’s a very loud and disorganized game.

We’re hunting mysterious carp

They sing riddles

Are you being fresh with me?

There are carp in the enchanted lake we need them to feed Prince Hal of Holbrooke

After we save the menagerie from Branny’s bombs

There shall be no bombs in this household!

It’s just a play Aunt

Don’t talk back to me, young lady!

Sorry Aunt

Why are you wearing a tea towel on your head?

It’s a disguise so the spies don’t see us

No we are the spies

So the others don’t see us I don’t remember who

May I have my tea towel, please.

Sorry Aunt

When you start doing the washing, then you may wear tea towels on your head.

Sorry Aunt

Till then, no tea towels.

Sorry Aunt we won’t wear any more tea towels

Do you have any carp we could use for our play

Preferably alive carp

I’ve had quite enough of your game. Where is Charlotte? Why isn’t she watching you?

She is watching us she’s Queen Sophia settling a disquieting mist on the guards

I’ll settle on her a disquieting mist! She was meant to be mending. Does it look like she’s mending?

Sorry Aunt can we go now the horses’ wings are on fire

You children are all mad!

Sorry Aunt can we go now

I shall have to talk with your father.

Sorry Aunt can we go now

THINGS A KING CAN’T DO IN GLASS TOWN

1. Nap under the neem tree whilst his councilors meet

2. Bomb his councilors

3. Say shut up to his councilors

4. Call his councilors old women or warty old women

5. Go off to war when his councilors are meeting

6. Declare war on his councilors

7. Kill the councilors’ horses or magic steeds

DEAR LADY—

in which Father seeks another mother

WIDOWER GENTLEMAN SEEKS LOVELY LADY

Dear Lady, How I long to meet you, and care for you as my own! You are all I think about during my leisure moments, which are few as I am an active man. I am recently widowed, and bereft, as any would be, having lost the singular-most jewel in his crown. Though I am slowed by grief, please know, I am not melancholy by nature: it is chiefly for my cubs I fret! Who shall be their mistress and tend to their hurts with a mother’s loving care? Who shall teach my daughters the graces and obligations of womanhood?

More about me: I am a serious man of early middle age (forty-four and one half ); I incline to hard work, and shall continue so till I am incapacitated by blindness or death. My origins are humble but honest, and I was educated to be a gentleman. I can be a lively storyteller, for I have inherited some of my Father’s blarney (they call me Paddy: I am Irish by birth!).

My household is well regulated, even after the loss of my Wife. My children know to contain their boisterousness when dining or entertaining guests. The eldest four read, and this occupies much of their day. We enjoy dinners together, and Sunday afternoons at the Park, where the children like to run and be children. We also enjoy the menagerie: our puppy Alabaster, Basket the hound, and assorted fish, birds, and guinea pigs. Our lives are simple; we know no luxury except that of being together. We consider ourselves abundantly blessed.

My work: I minister to the poor. I seek justice. I right wrongs.

Most humbling moment: Watching my Wife expire, not longer than a month ago. She retained her dignity almost to the last.

Why you should get to know me: I am an upright man with a rent-controlled apartment. I am called brusque but am a gentleman, and strive always to do Good. You shall never lack affection or good counsel. I can teach you Latin and give you a family with six precious children to make your life complete. Maria, my eldest, is a shining light. Eight already, she is as wise and virtuous as any Poet or Judge. Eliza (nearly 7) has an eye for beauty, and does well in needlework. She could assist you with the linens—both ironing and mending. Lotte (5), also known as Charlotte, or Charley-Barley, or Charlemagne, depending on her mood, is impetuous, but learning to be moderate. She would have you know anything which is on her mind, even if you would not listen, though if you did, you would be surprised by what you hear. Branwell (Bran) is my Only Son (4). He is a brave soldier with an outgoing temperament (were I to allow it, he might make a life for himself on the stage—but I shall steer him otherwise). Emily (3) is old enough to talk but prefers her own counsel, and the company of dogs, or any squirrel on the street! Baby Anne is too unformed to manifest character, but she is petted by her sisters, and shall grow into a fine girl. I know you shall love—and tolerate!—my wastrels as I do. If this profile satisfies, please contact me, so we might learn more about each other, with a view toward marriage by early spring.

Income: My funds are barely sufficient to support my Family, so you must be willing to bring your own. Also, my son’s education shall be in want of subsidy. Your funds should be inherited or already accumulated, as your labor will be needed in the household.

What I’m looking for: A robust woman, unafraid of hard work. Ladylike manners. A modest woman of refinement. Cheerful, perhaps not desirous of additional children. Healthy. Love of teaching, reading, cleaning a plus. Because my Family requires much energy, it is best that you be under the age of 30 and unmaimed.

SWEETNESS AND OUR HEARTS' DESIRE—

in which Maria remembers Mother

Papa shall be home any minute! The children are ready, all six of them!

He probably doesn’t realize it’s New Year’s Eve.

Only Maria remembers New Year’s Eve. Mama made everyone’s favorite, before she died: meat and veg for Papa; applesauce for Bran; bread, melon balls, egg rolls for Lotte, Liza, Maria. Em’s favorite was everything because she didn’t know, and Annie was barely born.

Mama would decorate the apartment with streamers and light, six colors for six children.

We are festooned! she would say. We are bedecked!

Mama liked to use two words when one would do.

Look, she’d say, hugging Maria, haven’t we the most festive, most delightful Haworthy House ever? (Haworth was the name of their building. The children do not live in a house!)

When everyone was seated, Em on Papa’s lap, Annie on Maria’s, Mama would point at the meat and veg and say, Look, here are All Good Things, and here, she’d say, pointing to the applesauce, is Hope! Spinach, her favorite, was Prosperity, melon balls were All Things in Good Time, the egg rolls Happy Days, and the bread A Mighty Good Laugh. So we might enjoy Prosperity, and Hope, and All Good Things with our new year, she liked to say.

For that one night, everything was perfect.

Maria reminded the little ones of this earlier that week. She assembled them, which means they sat in a circle on the floor of the lounge.

But bread isn’t my favorite, Lotte said. My favorite is always cereal.

It was bread at that time, said Maria.

I don’t think so, said Lotte. It’s always cereal, as long as I can remember.

My memory is better than yours, Maria said, because I am old and you are not.

Maria is nearly nine. Since their mother died a year ago, Maria has been their Little Mother. Papa thought he might find another, but none will have us, said he.

It was me, Lotte said, so I remember.

Lotte is six and three-quarters, which is almost seven, old enough to know for herself, she would have thought.

Maria knows better than to argue with children, who are unable to reason, according to Papa, but this was important. Do it right this year, and they might do it right next year, and the year after that. Do it wrong now, and that part of their life was gone forever.

Would you really want cereal for New Year’s Eve dinner? Maria asked. What would you do then for New Year’s Eve breakfast?

Lotte could see the sense of that. So the children conspired throughout the week, considering what details they could. Maria has a food allowance—for peanut butter and jelly, jelly alone, soup in a can, toast and sardines. To make things easy, Monday is soup-in-a-can day, etc. The allowance isn’t enough for streamers, six colors for six children, it isn’t enough to festoon or bedeck, but Liza has supervised drawings, each of a family scene, and on New Year’s Eve taped them to the wall, though Annie’s was more of a multicolored scrawl. Maria has collected what coins she could find. These are coins Papa is more or less giving away, as he leaves them in his pants. Still, she didn’t have enough.

I will do without egg rolls, she said. The applesauce and melon balls would double as desserts—what their mother called Sweetness and Our Hearts’ Desire.

So now it’s New Year’s Eve, and everything is perfect! Papa takes his dinners out, to have peace and consider his work, so probably he’s eaten, but that can’t be helped.

It’s Monday so maybe he thinks it’s soup in a can, but no! Maria has made something special, and here’s Papa, turning the key in the lock!

Six children await him, more or less in a row. They have been waiting some time, so there has been giggling and some departure from the row. But now they stand, eagerly, each holding a hand, all holding their breath, girls wearing white dresses and pinafores on which Liza, inspired by their father’s botany book, has embroidered something—poppy for Maria, violet for Lotte, pansy for Em, a modest daisy for herself. Annie wears a pale pink romper, gift of a mother upstairs, while Bran wears the whitest shirt he has, which is yellow, with shorts—at least they’re not red or blue. Maria has found a comb and pulled the girls’ hair, wet, into braids: maybe they will stay that way! Annie’s whisper-thin hair, blond and baby fine, has received a red bow from a wrapping paper tie. All faces are scrubbed. Branwell later obtained jam on the chin (he cannot explain), which Maria wiped and pinched, though gently.

What have we here? Papa asks as he enters the foyer which serves as their dining room. Six children, so neatly dressed! Maria, you have done this, I suppose?

Happy New Year! Emily, barely four, says, though she has been instructed to wait. Already, she’s fussing with her braids, already she’s pulling an elastic from her hair.

There’s turkey for everyone! Charlotte yells, for she knows this is what will make Papa glad, and in fact, turkey boils at this very moment.

The children are ruining everything: Papa was supposed to sit at the table lovingly set by Liza. He would affix his napkin to his collar and Maria would bring out the surprise! Turkey, boiled in six sealed bags (Em would share with Anne), complete with gravy, rich and brown. Papa would clap with delight and safely snip the bag tops and squeeze gravy and turkey onto their plates so no one would be burned, or soiled. Then Maria would bring out the frozen peas which she had boiled. A two-course meal, meat and veg!

Good work, Maria, Papa says, for no matter how the children ruin everything, he always knows. You have made dinner?

Maria nods, unable to speak.

We shall sit in ascending order, youngest first, Papa says, and Maria is relieved that the evening is Papa’s now. She is tired. Organizing children is difficult! But Annie doesn’t have her own seat, which Papa doesn’t remember. Maria grabs Annie and sits, Annie on her lap.

Excellent, Papa says. Now Em, now Lotte . . .

Branwell comes before Lotte, Lotte says, which is true.

Just making sure you’re paying attention, Papa says, but Lotte suspects that isn’t true.

No, Branwell, that’s my chair. Please sit in a child-sized chair. There you go. Lotte. Liza. Excellent. Ah, but now Maria, you must get the food, I imagine.

He hasn’t done things right at all. Maria passes Annie to Liza. It’s okay, she thinks, it’s going to be okay.

Maria has a platter for the turkey boiled with gravy in individual plastic bags, she has a pair of scissors with which to snip the top, she has peas in a bowl. She has to explain the scissors and the bags to Papa, who at first looks dismayed rather than pleased.

Ingenious! he cries. What a clever girl (as if Maria had put the turkey in the bags)!

Papa does the honors, gently dropping turkey slices from plastic bags onto every plate, then squeezing gravy, which all agree is the best part. Maria distributes the peas.

There’s a quiet moment when it’s unclear if Papa will remember.

The turkey is All Good Things, Maria prompts.

It certainly looks delicious, Papa says. Good job, Maria!

And these, she whispers in Papa’s direction, pointing at the peas, are Prosperity.

There is silence.

You’re not doing it right, Lotte says to Papa, her chin cradled in her clasped hands.

Elbows, Maria says, and Lotte removes them from the table.

Because it is only right we enjoy Prosperity and All Good Things on this most joyous day! Papa says.

The children smile, though it seems Papa’s face trembles.

Shall we toast? Papa says. But we haven’t