The Death of a Sister

I laid my sister to rest last year. I wrapped up our tattered bond and shut the coffin for the final time. For years, I have laid her to rest, only to resurrect her time and time again. With every resurrection, I vowed I would hold on tighter, try harder. I told myself, “Be more careful this time. Tread lightly, don’t make any sudden moves, think before you speak, you cannot afford to lose her again”.  My sister is three years older than I and we shared the same abusive childhood.  As a child I would cling to her as we hid under a bed or in a closet stashed behind a box or a black garbage bag filled with clothes, as our father angrily walked up and down the stairs, striking his belt against the banister, threatening to beat us once he found us. She made me feel safe. I trusted her. I never wanted to imagine a life without her.

 As my sister turned into a teenager, she was forever insecure about her looks. Our mother had always kept my sister in secondhand clothes passed down from our cousins. She made her wear big, round glasses that took up much of her face. Those frames floated across her features like storm clouds, dimming what lay beneath. While most of the other girls in her class were wearing makeup and going to sleep overs, my sister was kept at home, where she was expected to take care of me and my two younger siblings so my mother could go work the night shift at M&M’s to escape our father. Looking back on it now, it was one of the cruelest things our mother ever could have done to us, and to my sister. 

One day, after many months of begging and pleading to be stripped away from the bug-eyed lenses that swallowed her face, our mother agreed to let her wear contacts. No one, not even I, could have predicted the storm that had gathered behind those clouds. Once unleashed, it would not simply pass, it would tear through us. No choice of words, no strength of hands, could steady the wreckage once the storm broke. 

Boys started to notice her. Girls started to hate her. I was in awe of her. She started to wear make-up. My mother looked at her in disgust as my father called her ugly. She defiantly put more makeup on, wore tighter clothes, teased her hair so high I swear it reached the heavens. I used to lay on the bed and watch her get ready. It took her hours as she would wash her face and hair over and over until it was all perfect. 

 Our house phone started to deliver threatening messages. She was bullied in school and beat up in the hallways for sleeping with some other girl’s boyfriend. She went from a straight A student to a drop out. It seemed as though my parents finally bonded over their abuse of her. The only time they worked as a team was when they were beating her for one thing or another. It was as if they took a disgusting delight in their new comradery. And when that didn’t work, they brought my aunt and uncle in to come have a talk with her. As everyone berated her, and us, I wanted to scream, “but you don’t know what they do to us! You don’t know how we live”! Looking back, I don’t think it would have mattered much as we were already labeled in the family as unruly. In their eyes, we brought despair to our parents. It was all our fault. Especially my sister. Now everyone looked at her in disgust; that is except for me. I still looked at her through adoring eyes, and an understanding heart. 

At 16, she got pregnant and married. My parents accepted it and threw her a small ceremony. I felt abandoned by her. How could she leave me with them and go on to forge her own family without me? I tried in vain to stay in her life. With the dissolution of her marriage, she abandoned her child with a friend as she took off in search of validation in what would become a long line of men. Abusive men. I tried to reach her, but I was grown and had all but given up on her. My eyes no longer adored her, and my heart couldn’t find a rhythmic, understanding beat. I was tired. That would be the first of many times I would lay my sister to rest.

As the years would pass, we would reconnect, vow to stay in each other’s lives. But with each reconnection, she became unrecognizable to me. At this point, she had three children, each with a different story to their father, yet never the priority. As I watched her children take a back seat to her never-ending search for self-validation, I began to look at her through eyes of disgust. I could not comprehend how she could not put her kids first. How could she allow countless men to come in and abuse not only her, but her children? I tried talking to her about it only to have her hang up on me and block me. With every hang up, every block, I told myself it was time to lay her to rest. And just as I was about to throw a fistful of dirt on her casket, each attempt she made at self-validation would fail. She would unblock me, apologize and I would exhume her. 

Last year, I had had enough, and I laid her to rest for the final time.  She married for the fourth time. This one could barely hold a job, while she successfully held a government job for close to 15 years. She was making great money. Our relationship was stronger than it’s been in years. I listened to her as she secretly planned to leave him. I supported her and I was excited to finally, after all these years, hear her speak with clarity and self-worth. She left him. I could not believe it. As she spoke about ending the relationship, I was proud of her. My heart beat with a rhythm of compassion and understanding. I stayed on the phone with her while she drove away with only the few things she could fit in her car. She was starting over again, leaving everything behind , but I didn’t judge given the fact she could finally see. She didn’t need glasses or contacts to get a clear view of the world around her. My mind was already planning our future, united in sisterhood, triumphantly standing tall despite our childhood trauma. 

A few days later, she was in my driveway. I listened to her that weekend speak unapologetically about leaving him. She was excited for her future. I was excited for her future. I gave her a brand-new TV since she didn’t have one. She said she didn’t have the money to give me for it. Don’t worry, I told her, just help me out one day if I need it. I told her this many times throughout the years as I would lend her money or give her things each time she started over. As she left that Sunday, a feeling came over me that was of an uncertain sadness. The following day I did not hear from her. I called over and over until she finally picked up. I knew it. This is her pattern. It’s what she does when she knows she is doing something wrong. She hides. She told me she was going back to him. I was in shock. Again. She quit her job and was moving back. I asked her for the money for the TV because I knew she would be broke in a month and she would sell it so she could buy him beer and food. I hated him for taking my sister away again. No way was I going to let him have anything that I worked for. She yelled at me, told me I was a bad sister who never supported her, and I only care about the money.

Tears slowly made their way down my cheeks, spilling over my jaw like a waterfall. In anger, I called him and told him all the ugly, nasty things she had said about him. How she plotted for months to leave him because he is such a loser. Truth be told, I wanted revenge. I wanted him to discard her like she discarded me over and over throughout my life. I wanted her to feel abandoned like she abandoned her child all those years ago. 

It’s been a little over a year since we spoke. I looked him up on Facebook. I went “pain shopping”, as one friend calls it. His relationship said “separated”.  For a second I felt happy about that. It meant that I was right about their relationship. That moment of happiness switched to sadness because what that meant, was that SHE was right about their relationship. Her lifelong quest for self-worth and validation lives within her. She has been traveling down roads searching for something she will never find for she doesn’t believe that it’s living in her.

My beautiful sister, as I lay you to rest for the final time, I want you to know that your worth was never swallowed by the enormity of the frames you wore on your face. Nor was it measured in the cast-off clothes you scoured through, in hopes that one might cloak you in a value you already possessed. Here I bury both you and the fragile dream of sisterhood that still lingers in me.