Incriminate Me

10: Five is hot

"The evil in our desires typically does not lie in what we want, but that we want it too much," -John Calvin

The phone rings in the still. It wakes me from my lost stupor of madness. My eyes are downcast as I survey the caller ID. My mother's name flashes on the screen, Aida, I pick it up with a finger that isn't quite steady.

"Darling! Did you hear the news?"

I stare at the wall across from me, legs pulled into my chest, the sheets tangled around me like my thoughts.

"It's late mom, is everything okay?"

She tuts, I can practically hear the brush of alcohol on her tone,

"Everything is splendid. Richard sent me a message this afternoon that he plans to propose to your sister."

I identify the giddy bubbles in her voice as a swell of pride and excitement. Having two daughters, my mother has dreamt of our weddings since we were little girls. She used to allow us to parade in her custom made gown, flouncing across the living room, her eyes alight with that spark of the future.

"I hadn't heard."

She laughs, it is an echoing sound. A sound I recall from late night evening parties, associated with the clink of champagne glasses and the shuffling of cards.

"Isn't it splendid? He is so confident he told me first, ha, talk about a man who knows what he wants."

I should be happy. My sister, Carmella, and I were close in our teens when our parents split. My father took his money with him, vacating our mother due to her close relationship with the bottle. I escaped the house at the same time Mella did, getting into a special course at Harvard at 17. By 18 I was in the undergraduate law classes, my father's name assisted in that.  My privilege has allowed me to claw at the ladder of success.

Mella went to arts school in Singapore, older than me by three years, she always loved to paint a utopia with her hands.

We have lost touch over the past few years, seeing each other on Christmas and Thanksgiving.

I bow my head and stare down at the phone.

"That's wonderful."

There is something wet on my cheek, hot and searing my skin. She beams through the device,

"Did you see him in those swim trunks last summer? My he is well endowed. A bit pudgy but with a bank account like that, well, who can complain."

I can feel my heart searching for my sister in the darkness of the night, wondering if she is happy, if she loves him, if she wants to say yes, if she is marrying him because he is so like our father.

"Mother. Stop it."

She lets out a huff,

"At least I am honest."

A pause.

"How are you and Tanner doing?"

The tear reaches my chin and trembles there. What If I die tomorrow? What if my mom wakes to a call that her little girl's body is strewn across a Chinese restaurant floor, drowning in her own blood?

What if this is it?

I close my eyes, my voice small,

"I love you, you know that, right?"

A beat.

"Of course, I mean you can be a stuck up ivy league bitch every now and then, but I raised you to be that. It's one of your best traits, honestly I wish your sister had more of a backbone."