Sisters and Secrets

Adelearay Balaguer walked among the flowers in the garden behind her home with her older sister, Callista.  The sisters had always been very close, even though they were seven years apart.  Since their father had left when the younger of the two was very small, Callista had served as a sort of second mother to Adelearay; she gave the girl love and comfort when their mother could not.
         As our story starts, we find the girls in Adelearay’s fifteenth summer.  They looked very much alike – anyone who got even just a passing glance would be able to tell they were sisters.  Adelearay always wore her light brown hair down, despite it being very long.  She saw her world from big, round, emerald green eyes.  Callista also had green eyes and brown hair, but her eyes were lighter and her hair was darker.  She wore her hair in a tight, neat bun, which accurately portrayed her personality; she was a strict young woman.
         “Did it rain last night, Calli?” Adelearay asked, noting the small bulbs of liquid covering and even slipping down the petals and leaves of the flowers.  She knelt down near a beautiful, glistening, scarlet rose.
         “You didn’t hear the thunder?”  Callista asked in shock, confirming her sister’s suspicions.  She should not have been so surprised – Adelearay had always been a heavy sleeper.  “It shook the house!”  Adelearay shook her head.  She pulled a sharp, short knife from a hidden pocket in her shoe.  “Adelearay Rosemary!”  The elder sister exclaimed in a gasp.
         “What?” the younger girl rolled her eyes.  “Don’t act like you’ve never seen a knife before.”  She cut the stem of the rose and replaced the knife in the pocket.  She stood up, grinning.  It was the most vibrant of her red roses.
         “What do you think you’re doing, carrying a blade around with you?”
         “It’s only a precaution.  Jeez, calm down.”  Adelearay strutted to the pond, her sister close behind.  “Besides, it comes in handy.  If I would have had to walk all the way back to the house for it, I wouldn’t have cut this rose.”  The teenager twirled the stem in her fingers, being mindful of the thorns.
         “You shouldn’t be cutting the roses anyway,” Callista scowled.  “What if that one wasn’t finished blooming?"
         Adelearay laughed, “Psh.  They’re my roses.  Besides that, I only cut one!  I’m going to dry it and put it in my journal.”  She grinned proudly, kneeling down at the pond’s edge with the rose still clutched carefully in her hand.  She dipped the fingers of her free hand into the water and wiggled them around.  She missed having fish in the pond.  “How long has it been since we had fish?”  Adelearay was terrible at keeping track of time, particularly because she didn’t care to.
         Callista sighed, “I don’t know, Ade.  It’s probably been a couple of months.”
         “Mom should go out and get more.”
         “She doesn’t have the time to tend to them.”
         “I can take care of them!”
         “You mean like last time?”  Adelearay looked up to see her sister with her hands on her hips.  Her foot was tapping lightly.
         “Oh… yeah.”  The younger girl grinned in an attempt at looking innocent, and got to her feet.  In the process, she managed to stick her hand with the rose thorns several times.  She stuck her bloody fingers in her mouth, smiling at Callista around them.  “’Ou luh me,” she said.
         Callista could not help but laugh.  “Yes, of course I love you, Ade.”
         The sisters made their way back through the flower garden, sitting on the old, marble bench that had been built halfway through the garden.  Adelearay was playing with her rose when Callista broke it’s spell on her: “Do you ever wish to be married, Adelearay?”
         The teenager looked at her sister in shock.  “What?  No – I mean – I haven’t really – why?”  Being the type of girl to live for today, she had never given much thought to her future.
         “I don’t know,” Callista smoothed her dress over her thighs.  “I just feel like I’m sort of old.  I should be married by now.  I should be…” she let out a slow breath, as though she was holding something back and trying to let it out all at the same time.  “I should be starting a family of my own.”
         “Don’t worry so much, Calli!  You’re only twenty-two!”  Adelearay scooted closer to her sister.  She wrapped her arms around Callista and laid her head on the woman’s shoulder.  “Besides, if you get married, you’ll have to leave me.”
         “I’ll always come back to visit, no matter what happens.”
         “I know, but it isn’t the same,” Adelearay whined.  “You won’t be in the room across the hall anymore.  I can’t talk to you whenever I want.”
         “You don’t know how to use a telephone, after all these years?”  Callista joked.
         “I can’t call you at two in the morning.  Your husband wouldn’t like that.”
         Callista laughed out loud at this.  “You can call me whenever you need me, Ade.  Any husband of mine can deal with it.”  The teenager smiled in relief.
         “But you need a husband as much as I do.  What’s that phrase Mom uses?  Oh, yeah!  You need a husband like you need a hole in the head!”  Callista shook her head, but a smile crept across her lips despite her attempt to keep a straight face.  “You are strong and independent, Calli, and you –“
         “There are some things that shouldn’t be done alone, Adelearay…” Then, in a small whisper, she added, “Even if, sometimes, they must be done alone.”
         “What the devil do you mean?”
         “Callista Lynn!  Adelearay Rosemary!” called a voice from the house.  “Supper!”
         “We should go in before our supper gets cold,” Callista said, thanking her God for saving her from having to explain herself at that time.
         “You’re going to tell me, Callista,” Adelearay said as she followed her sister into the house.
         They sat down at the dinner table with their mother.  The older woman’s face was more rounded than her daughters’, and her hair had slivers of silver throughout (that she would deny was there, even if you put her in front of a mirror and showed them to her).  Her nose was hooked slightly because it had been broken when she was a child, and her fingers were gnarled with arthritis despite her only being in her late-forties.
         The three of them said grace – Adelearay just pretended to say it in her head, as she had lost her faith ages ago.  Even Adelearay wondered whether she had ever truly believed in the same God as her mother and sister.  She could not remember a time when she had ever put her faith in the Lord.  After what seemed like a lifetime (and it only felt that long because Adelearay had been daydreaming and missed lunch), the girl heard the end of the prayer and had to resist shouting, “Finally!”
         As they enjoyed the meal, the sisters listened to their mother go on about her day.  She complained about some client of hers and gushed about some new coworker.  Even though she was much older, she and her eldest daughter were much alike at times.  At the end of Ms. Balaguer’s story, Adelearay volunteered to do the dishes, “but only if Calli dries!”  Callista, however, had other intentions.
         “Actually, um, I wanted to take my nightly walk early,” Callista said, giving her sister an apologetic smile.  “I’ll do the dishes on my own tomorrow, though.  I promise.”  She moved her chair back; Adelearay glared at her the whole way to the hall.  “I’ll be back in a couple of hours, Mother.”
         “Don’t be too late, dear.”  Ms. Balaguer got up from the table as well, touching her younger daughter’s shoulder as she passed.  “Come now, Adelearay.  I’ll help you with the dishes.”
         Once out of the house, Callista hurried down the road.  She couldn’t help noticing that the sky was a pale blue, already holding beautiful streaks of orchid and rose.  She found her way to a large farm house with a barn in the back.  She walked up the dirt driveway, veering off to the side in order to get to the porch.  She raised her fist to knock when she realized that the person she came to see was sitting on the porch swing.
         “Alec,” she breathed his name as he stood and wrapped her up in his arms in one fluid movement.
         “I missed you, Callista, darling.”  Alec kissed her tenderly, bringing a smile to her lips.  She felt so safe in his strong arms – but even more than that, she felt as though her body was melding into his.
         “I don’t have long,” she whispered sadly.
         “You never have long,” he chuckled, whisking her inside the house.  He wasted no time at all, pulling her directly to his bedroom.  “You’re beautiful,” he purred as he pushed her gently onto his bed.  He climbed over top of her and captured her lips in an eager, hungry kiss.
         “Oh, am I?”  Callista asked demurely when he eased back. 
         “As always, love,” he smiled.  A smile pulled at Callista’s lips as well, her ego swelling as well as her affection for the man whose body was so very close to hers.  She ran her fingers through the sandy-colored hair that was cut a little too short for her liking; Alec liked it that way, though.  “You are absolutely beautiful,” he complimented again.
         “At a loss for words, are we?”  The woman giggled, “Why now?  You always have something to say.”
         Alec merely grinned.  It was the true kind of grin; the kind that reached the deep blue of his eyes.  He did not answer his lover’s question at first.  Instead, he ignored it and kissed along her neck.  She craned it slightly to the side for him as the smile on her lips grew.  He stopped only once – only to coo the words, “Maybe it’s because I’m in love with you.”