After she had climbed back out of the cellar, the kitchen felt sterile and utilitarian by comparison. Never a cook, Eileen knew for sure that her sister had spent only as much time as absolutely required in this room. After searching through several cupboards, she finally found one with row after row of delicate stemware. Eileen plucked one from the bunch and a wine opener from the utensils drawer before heading upstairs to the one room that would bring her the closest to the sister she had lost.

In Clare’s study, Eileen closed the door quietly behind herself and placed both bottles and her glass on the coffee table in front of the couch. The sun was now below the horizon, throwing its last rays of orange and red into the twilight sky. She cut the foil on the 1975 bottle and pulled the cork, leaving it on the screw while she poured herself a glass of the brick-red, aromatic wine. She stood, placed the glass to her lips, and wished like hell Clare was here with her now. She took a small sip, then another larger one as the complex combination of red cherry, hints of cinnamon, and earthy notes of leather promised to help her avoid thoughts, steeped in deep regrets, that she didn’t want to allow herself to think.

What if I had reached out to Clare, picked up the phone?

Eileen stopped them all short. She would, eventually, allow herself to nosedive into all the things she should and could have done, all the ways she might have been a better sister; there would be self-inflicted retribution.

But not tonight. After a day spent picking the color and fabric texture of Clare’s coffin, tonight was only for remembering and saying goodbye. And the best way she could think to remember her sister was through her own words. With her glass in hand, Eileen turned toward the bookshelves that held Clare’s journals.

She took another long drink and considered an entry point into Clare’s past.

Today, visiting her mother had been an absolute disaster. She would need to go back and try again. Her mother’s misunderstanding had her thinking, about their life in Casper, about the accident, about the time when Adam had died and Clare had survived.

She reached for the journals and pulled several from the shelf and onto the floor, opening random covers and reading first pages until she found exactly what she was looking for. It was an entry from right before Clare moved out of Casper.

My mother gave me her gun today. I’m supposed to take it with me when I move to New York tomorrow.

Chapter 19

Clare

Nineteen years before her death