Her eyes water. “I told you, I don’t know. I swear. They were dressed nice, real professionals. They helped her get some papers, and the next thing I knew she was a part of our family. Mama wouldn’t talk to me about it, and Emmy wouldn’t talk at all, but my neighbor Betsy told me Mama had a sister once. I never knew about her. She said Mama’s sister was adopted, and that she was something evil. No one spoke of her.”
An irritated grumble rises up my throat. “What happened to Emmy?”
“Well ...” She swallows, glances down at the floor. “Mama said ... she said Emmy needed to be cleansed of her past, and of her own Mama. After the priest came, she told Emmy stories all about her life now, telling her this is the only life she’s ever had. She tried to get Emmy to repeat her new name back to her, to tell her she understood that I’m her sister and she’s her mama, but Emmy—she wouldn’t say a word.”
My gaze slides back to the crate in front of me, and my stomach twists.She wouldn’t say a word.
“So”—Frankie closes her eyes and takes a deep breath—“so Mama locked her in the doghouse and repeated over and over again who the Lord is, who Mama is, who I am, whosheis—Emmy May Highland from Presley, Mississippi—until Emmy finally echoed it back at her.”
“How long was that?” My voice is low, fury gripping my lungs. When Frankie doesn’t answer, I snap, “HOW LONG?”
“F-forty-two d-days,” she whimpers through sobs. Her body shakes, and she wraps her arms around her chest. “It took forty-two days for her to believe it. I-I snuck out to lie with her every night. I begged her to just say it. Say what Mama wanted. I d-didn’t know what to do. But I swore. I swore from then on I would always be there for her. I would be her sister. I would be the best sister she ever had.”
My eyes shut as the fire in my lungs reaches my throat.
“I love her. I really do love her like my sister,” Frankie whispers. Her words only irritate the flames. “I even tried to love her art. I knew it was important. She had to get it out. But sometimes ... sometimes I could hardly look at it, and I worried she saw right through me. Eventually the guilt—it just ate at me more and more every day. I had to get away. From Mama, from everything. I always had to get away.” She pauses, thank fuck, then looks around the room and mutters, “A-and now look what I’ve done.”
I slip my fingers through Emmy’s crate, stroking the soft strands of her hair and rubbing them between the rough pads of my fingers. She won’t stop rocking. Singing. Shaking.
Sofia.
Emmy.
Whoever she is.
Somewhere along the way, she weaved herself so deeply into my veins I can’t fucking inhale without her breathing life into me. When she first arrived, I wanted to get under her skin. I wanted to see if I could break her without even touching her.
But, fuck.
I had no idea I’d already broken her.
