She refuses to look at me.
“I made up your old room,” Serena says.
“I don’t want to stay here.”
“Oh—”
“I want a hotel,” Arden sniffs, glancing at me. “Can we get one?”
I nod slowly, taking her hand in mine and squeezing. “We can, but I think your sisters need their Biggie. I think you need both of your Smalls, Arden. I think we should stay here, even though it might hurt like a bitch.”
One thing is very clear to me: the three Doll sisters need each other right now. They need to bridge this raw, painful gap between them. She needs to stay here. She can’t avoid this one, not when they mean so much to her. She needs to make this better for herself because she won’t survive this if it gets worse.
Arden’s eyes flicker to Serena.
Even though Anya is furious, it’s only because she’s heartbroken. I’m certain that Arden understands that. She’s smart. People react differently in these situations, and I won’t hold Anya’s venom against her, even if it infuriates me that those words were aimed at Red with the intention to wound her.
“Fine.”
Serena lets out a small breath of relief.
I pray this doesn’t backfire on all of us.
CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO
arden
Haveyou ever been to a funeral where you’re the center of attention, but somehow the most out of place?
I don’t recommend it.
All day, seated in the front row, shaking hands and accepting condolences that don’t belong to me. Words that I don’t want. I begged my sisters to let me sit behind them instead, but one look from Anya told me that was not happening.
The first row of a funeral is the most agonizing seat you could ever take in life.
Ahead of the service, my sisters and I went into the chapel for a private moment together. I don’t know why anybody chooses an open casket, but my Dad did. It was almost a relief, seeing the same face I remembered. There he was. Looking like himself, only older. His hair now speckled with gray, a little smile pulled on the corner of his mouth.
Dad.
I imagine I was supposed to feel something in that moment. The world should have come crashing down at thesight of his face. I should have been debilitated by regret and grief and all the things I should have done differently.
I felt nothing.
Anya crumbled. Serena and I had to hold her up by her elbows to keep her standing. Rena was shaking so badly and got so pale that I had to force her to sit before she passed out. Then Anya reached out to touch Dad’s arm, expecting to feel his warmth and not a solid slab of stone. She rushed out of the building in full-blown hysterics. My aunt and uncles spent half an hour trying to calm her down.
Then, there was me. Feeling nothing. Nothing at all.
I went to him, though. I placed my hand on the side of the casket and looked down at my father, who I wish could have been my dad. People romanticize a lot of things in life, even more so in death. Forgiveness is one of them. I was expected to forgive him because he was sick. Now, I’m expected to because he’s dead. It feels like his ability to rest in peace is relying on me giving him that peace from beyond the grave. It’s what I’m supposed to do.
But I can’t.
He doesn’t deserve it.
This man and all his handsome edges, the markers on him that I see in my sisters, he never gave me peace while he was here. He created a monster inside me, one that used to be a little girl with hope in her heart. She already lost her Mommy. There was no way she’d make it out alive when her Daddy turned on her. And boy, did he turn. He doesn’t need my forgiveness. He’s never needed anything from me. He’ll be just fine.
I picture myself in my favourite pyjamas, hanging onto Stinky in the doorway of my parents’ room. I was eleven, but losing Mom made me feel five again. My Dad was sprawled out on his bed, empty liquor bottles on the nightstand,sobbing into his arm loud enough that he was scaring my sisters.
I wanted to comfort him because even at that young age, I knew the depth of the love he had for my mother. I padded toward the bed and placed my hand on his arm. He swatted me away so violently that I flew onto the floor. He didn’t look to see if I was okay. He barely lifted his head. He just covered his face with his arms and wept.
