The Story Sisters

Elv was naked, she seemed like snow herself, her skin was so pale. She was crying over Mother as Lorry kissed her. She felt unwound in his arms. They were completely entwined when they heard the door open. Claire was there, whimpering, apologizing. Elv leaped out of bed and went to the door.

“God, Claire! What the hell are you doing?” She touched her sister’s forehead. “You’re burning up.”

Claire peered around her sister. “Was that Justin Levy’s ghost?”

Elv turned to look. Lorry had gone through the window, into the rain.

“Justin doesn’t have a ghost,” she assured Claire.

She brought Claire into her room, closed the door, then took her sister into bed.

“You don’t know that,” Claire insisted. She felt panic-stricken and faint. “He used to come into our room. I think he’s still doing that.”

“It was Lorry, silly. I told you about him.”

“The one you’re in love with.”

“The one who turns me inside out.”

“Doesn’t it hurt?” Claire said in a hushed voice.

“Yes.” Elv looked out at the rain. “It does.”

She shoved the drug paraphernalia he’d left behind into the night table drawer. Lorry hadn’t had time to collect it all. She could still feel him all over her. She pulled on a nightgown and got into bed with Claire. She had Lorry’s works and enough for her to get high later by herself. She loved the dreamy way she felt. There was the sound of the rain, comforting against the window-pane. He’d be drenched as he ran to his car. He’d be thinking of her all night long.

“He comes from the world underground.” Elv gave her sister a sip of water from the tumbler on her night table, along with two aspirin.

“No, he doesn’t.” Claire almost laughed, but she felt too weak.

“You can find the gate if you walk along Thirty-third Street right behind Penn Station. You have to go down eight stories, under the trains, under the subway. There are ten thousand steps with wild creatures all around. There are black roses growing beside the tracks.”

“He comes from Arnelle?” Claire was confused.

“Go to sleep,” Elv told her. “You’ll be better in the morning. You won’t even remember this.”

“Yes, I will.” Claire was so glad that her sister was back. “I always will.”

MRS. WEINSTEIN WAS the one who phoned to report seeing a man slinking through their window. She had nothing to do but gossip and butt her nose in where it wasn’t wanted. Elv came out of her room to find her mother calling the police. She grabbed the receiver away.

“It wasn’t a criminal. Don’t report him,” she pleaded.

“Elv,” Annie said. “How could you?”

“How could I what? Find true love? Get what you never had?”

Claire was still in bed; she stayed under the covers, listening to them fight. She’d found a photograph of Lorry under the pillow. She gazed at him, then hurriedly returned the picture when Elv slammed back into the room. She was being sent away to their grandmother’s, and that suited her perfectly.

“Help me pack, Gigi,” she said to Claire.

Claire got out of bed and went to the bureau. Elv had burned most of her clothes. They tossed everything she had into a single suitcase. Right before she left she retrieved the photo from under her pillow. She kissed Claire on either check and told her not to forget her, as if that would ever happen.

AFTER HER GRANDDAUGHTER moved into her New York apartment, Natalia had the same feeling of dread she’d had in Paris when Madame Cohen warned her to keep an eye on Elv. Some girls were in danger of vanishing just as children in fairy tales disappeared, out the door, under the hedge, never to be found again. But in fact, Elv was well behaved. She helped with the dishes. She played cards with her ama. She slept on the clean, white sheets and took baths in verbena bath oil in the big marble tub in her grandmother’s bathroom. She tried on all of her ama’s old clothes—black satin suits, white lace blouses, high heels, blue cashmere sweaters with crystal buttons, Chanel jackets that fitted her perfectly—then paraded around for her grandmother’s approval.

But she often disappeared for hours, even days, and when she returned she was too exhausted to talk; she simply crawled between the white sheets and fell so deeply asleep that Natalia couldn’t wake her for dinner. It snowed nearly every day, and Elv usually woke in the late afternoon to go meet Lorry. They had their rendezvous spot in Manhattan, as they’d had their meeting place in New Hampshire. It was just beyond the meadow where the dog, Mother, had been buried. Lorry had taken Elv there, and they’d left a handful of roses stolen from the market on the corner. The weather had turned and Lorry was still looking for an apartment, so they met in an underpass near the zoo. It was easy to forget you were in Manhattan in their corner of the park. Everything was muffled and quiet. It made Elv think of New Hampshire. She still missed the horses. She wondered who was taking care of them and if they would remember her if she ever went back.

Elv hadn’t thought she needed to get high, but sometimes there was something needy snaking through her, rising to the surface. It was hot, dangerous. It felt like the way she needed him. At last she heard footsteps on the path. Lorry appeared, wearing his black coat and a black woolen hat. He looked beautiful in the snow. Snow didn’t bother him. Nothing did. He reminded her of a man in a fairy tale who could always find his way, even without a map.