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Kit places her hands on the sides of her head. “I don’t believe this.” Then she looks rabidly at the group. “Does anyoneelsehave a secret they’ve been keeping from me? Anyone? You’d better say it now. I can’t take much more than this.”
The room is silent. Even the A/C has clicked off. Suddenly, there’s a small, weak cry in the corner. Everyone whirls around to look at Aurora. She’s in her seat again, her knees pulled up to her chest. Her face has drained of color.
“What’s the matter?” Kit’s eyebrows shoot up.
Aurora glances desperately at Sienna. There’s that strange exchange between the two of them, and my skin starts to prickle. “Tell her,” Aurora pleads.
Alarm registers on Sienna’s face. She gives a slight shake of her head.
“Tell me what?” Kit asks, straightening, her tone verging on panic.
The girls watch one another. For a while, no one speaks—maybe no one evenbreathes.Finally, Aurora looks down and breathes in raggedly. “It was me,” she says softly, into her shirt.
“What?” Kit asks.
“It was me,” Aurora repeats. “I did it.”
“Aurora, stop it,” Sienna snaps. “Stop talking.”
Kit turns slowly so that she’s facing her daughters. “What are you talking about?” She whips back to Aurora. “What did you do?” She grabs the girl by the shoulders. “What did you do?”
Aurora shields herself with her hands. She’s bawling now. “It just happened! I read the e-mails, and they disgusted me, and I was just trying to protect her!”
Kit’s jaw goes slack. I’m so stunned I have to sit down.What is Aurora saying?
“Protect who?” Kit asks. She looks at Sienna, then back at Aurora again. “Aurora knew you wrote the Lolita e-mails, is that it?” Neither girl reacts. Kit keeps trying. “But why did you feel like you needed toprotectSienna? You didn’t want anyone to find out? You thought Greg was going to hurt her?”
All I can see of Aurora’s lowered head is her crown. She shakes miserably. “No.No.”
“Nowhat?” Kit’s voice has risen to a shriek. She looks desperately at Sienna. “What is she talking about?” But Sienna is stricken, motionless in her chair.
“Sienna didn’t plant those e-mails,” Aurora mumbles into her chest. She sounds both angry and devastated.
We look back and forth between the girls. Sienna is hiding her face in her hands, her long, elegant legs crossed prettily at her ankles. Even though I can’t see her face, I can practically feel her shame. It oozes out of her the same way it oozed out of me. And then I think of what Sienna told me after Greg’s funeral, about why the two sisters were fighting:We had a fight about this guy... it’s dumb.
My skin goes cold.
I turn to Aurora slowly. “You thought the e-mails between Greg and Sienna were real.”
Aurora shrinks in the chair, but after a pained few moments, she nods. “I... I saw him, once. He touched her... inappropriately. And she didn’t pull away.” She glances up at her sister, and there is fear in her eyes.
“Is thistrue?” Kit gasps.
Sienna lowers her hands just a little. Her face is a mask of pain. “I couldn’t,” she whispers. “I couldn’t pull away.”
Kit’s body is rigid. “Those e-mails reallywerefrom him? You didn’t write both sides? The e-mails...werereal?”
Sienna’s eyes flit to her mother’s for only a second, then lower again. “I can’t do this,” she blubbers, and then gets up and runs out of the room.
46
KIT
SATURDAY, MAY 6, 2017
For a moment, everyone is too stunned to move. Then I wrench away from the bed after my daughter. Willa catches my arm. “Wait. Just let her... decompress.”
“Decompress?” I run my hands down the length of my face. My heart is racing so fast I can hardly see straight. “What did she just tell us? Did she justconfesssomething?”
