When We Were Sisters (32 page)

39

Robin

Cold Creek, Florida. Population 3,129. The number on the welcome sign surprised me when I drove into town. Why would anybody live here? Cold Creek is a blip on the map, a quick stop for travelers on their way somewhere more inviting, a place to fill their gas tanks or slurp a Strawberry Cheesecake Blizzard at the Dairy Queen. During the two years I lived with the Osburns, the Cold Creek Dairy Queen had a reputation as the best for fifty miles. Since during those years I never traveled far from the ranch, I can't speak from experience.

Probably half of those 3,129 souls are spread through the countryside, and the others live in the town that meanders a few blocks in all directions from the spot where I'm parked. The ubiquitous Dollar Store anchors one block, along with what looks like a descendant of the Blue Heron Café where Jud Osburn ate lunch and flirted with the servers whenever he came into town. A Southern Baptist and a Methodist church bookend the next, and a bar with a neon bronco bucking in the window sits between a vacant lot and a movie theater.

The week before it closed the theater probably showed Hopalong Cassidy flicks and newsreels. Since it was vacant and moldering when I lived here, it's hard to believe the building still stands. But right now I'm parked in front of it, watching the street. Nothing and no one is moving, and I wonder if the Christmas lights, still strung between telephone and electric poles, will be seen by a single soul other than me if they snap on tonight.

I know Cecilia isn't going to materialize on the sidewalk with a soft-serve cone in one hand and a pack of two-for-one trouser socks in the other, but I'm taking a few minutes to gather courage for the next leg of my journey.

Cold Creek is Florida cattle-ranching country. Arcadia, about thirty miles west of here, holds a championship rodeo in March. Okeechobee, about thirty miles east on the northern rim of Lake Okeechobee, has an annual cattle drive through the center of town. I know these things because my smartphone tells me so. If rodeos and cattle drives were held when Cecilia and I lived with the Osburns, they attended without us. Who knows what that much fun might have done to us?

Who knows what this trip back in time will do?

My sister has disappeared. She isn't answering her cell phone and clearly doesn't want to be found. Donny is worried she's come to Cold Creek ahead of schedule, perhaps to ease herself into this final segment of filming. He's flying out as soon as he can get on a plane, but nobody in the world is better equipped to find her than I am. We've known all along that the Osburn ranch would be the most difficult of difficult venues for both of us.

I wonder if Cecilia
is
testing her own reactions or if she's simply decided to cancel this portion and gone somewhere else to recover. If so she'll let us know soon. Most likely I'll celebrate, because that means I can leave, too. Surely Mick has filmed enough of Cecilia's personal history to illustrate whatever he ultimately decides to say about foster care.

For this leg of the journey I rented a small SUV, since Donny reported that the roads at the ranch are in bad condition. Before deciding to shoot here Mick consulted a location scout to determine we would be safe. For the past ten years the property has been unoccupied, but apparently at some time work was done to shore up the house and barn. Four years ago an investment company bought the acreage after minerals from new wells caused so many problems, the citrus conglomerate that had tried to bring the land back to life moved to another site. Getting permission to film had required few negotiations.

Back in the day when rain fell regularly, Jud and Betty tended their own small grove. Fresh squeezed orange juice still brings back memories of breakfast at the Osburn table. Three-hundred acres was a small spread compared to others in the county, but the Osburns tried a little of everything. Citrus, Mulefoot hogs, truck farming and their lifeblood, Cracker cattle, a unique strain, like the Mulefoot, that Jud bred to sell. We foster children were a cash crop, too, like the other animals they raised—only we slept in the house. There were so many nights when Betty and Jud were screaming at each other that I wished I could sleep in the barn, too.

With nothing else to see in town I started the car and pulled out to the street to head for the ranch. The same location scout had determined there were no acceptable hotel accommodations here, and the drive to anywhere larger was too long to be sensible. Mick had rented campers to be delivered and set up tomorrow at a private campground a short distance from the ranch. We would have the place to ourselves.

In the meantime the rest of the crew is gathering at the house on the lake in Tampa for meetings. Cecilia and Donny were supposed to arrive tomorrow evening. Now I've asked Donny to stay there until he hears more. For all I know, he's part of Cecilia's problem.

The scenery, if not the route, was familiar. I passed green fields fenced for cattle with moss-draped oaks for shade, and occasional stands of cypress, scrubby pine, palm and palmetto. As I turned off the main road and began to wind my way through the countryside I glimpsed a pond and a prefab home with a plowed garden stretching far in front of it. As a young teen, I never drove these roads, so I let my smartphone guide me.

Although it wasn't yet dark, a thin, eerie mist was already glazing the landscape. In my past, on the hottest of mornings, Cold Creek, which meanders along the edge of the Osburns' property, breathed tendrils of dancing vapor into the warmer air. The creek is fed by a spring miles away, and the Osburns used it for irrigation, although even then the creek grew shallower each month. In the years since, because of persistent drought and increased tapping of the aquifer, the output has diminished to almost nothing. The scout had informed Mick there would be no pictures of Cold Creek to establish setting. At the moment the creek is dry as dust.

Fifteen minutes from town I stopped at the entrance to what had once been the Osburn ranch. No gate marked the gap in a three-rail fence that was tumbling to the ground. When I lived here tall posts flanked the entry, but now only a cattle guard announced that livestock had once grazed their way across these fields. I could see the house in the distance, and even from the road I could tell by the sagging roof that it was on the way to oblivion. Never well tended during our years in residence, neglect was hastening its end.

I drove across the guard and down the long, rutted trail to the house. The Osburns' citrus grove on the right had been leveled. The barn, still standing, was in the distance on my left. Other outbuildings were now heaps of wood and stone.

I half expected to see Cecilia's car, but mine was alone. It would be like my sister to park behind trees or a tumbledown outbuilding to hide her presence. She'd made every attempt to keep her whereabouts a secret, so why stop now? I only hoped that wherever she was, she was alone and unrecognized.

I parked and got out. I didn't expect a response, but I shouted, “Cecilia!” Then I repeated it again, and once more out of frustration.

In the patch of woods beyond the house a Chuck-will's-widow answered, the call so much like Virginia's whip-poor-wills. Betty, who didn't have another ounce of sentiment in her body, loved birds. She never made a point of teaching me anything except what I had to know to work in the garden or kitchen, but she spoke so seldom that when she mentioned the name of anything, I remembered it.

The sun was sinking, and in an hour it would be completely dark. This land was so filled with ghosts, I wasn't going to linger, not even for Cecilia, but I took a deep breath and walked up to the porch, then navigated sagging steps, cell phone in hand in case I needed to summon help. The front door, which had always stood open to capture a breeze, sagged on one hinge, and the screen door was nearly rusted through. I reached into a gaping hole and pushed the door. To my surprise it swung open with a loud creak.

A noise, a blur, and suddenly something streaked past me. I screeched, but by the time I opened my mouth the animal, most likely a raccoon or a possum, had zipped beyond, disappeared down the steps and, probably hidden itself under the house.

When my heart was beating normally again I shouted “Cecilia” into the hallway. I didn't expect a reply. If my sister was inside, the animal I'd just encountered would have left with her arrival, and the door would have been standing open.

I retraced my steps to the car, but I leaned against the passenger door and scanned the slowly dimming landscape. I tried to think where, if she had been here, she might have gone. Buzzards circled behind the house where a pond had once watered livestock, and while I was sure their presence was unrelated to my search, I got into the car and drove the overgrown, corrugated road toward the barn, stopping halfway in between to get out and peer into the distance. The buzzards had already dispersed, most likely on their way to something more promising, and my unanswered shouts were a lonely echo.

I drove past the spot once occupied by Betty's flourishing vegetable garden and glimpsed the remnants of a new citrus grove, row after row choked by weeds, with only a few trees clinging to life. The grove was smaller than the garden had been. The rows didn't even extend to the garden's edge, where compost bins had rested against deer fencing and chicken wire. I'd spent so many hours of my early teens at this spot, tending and picking tomatoes, hoeing and weeding, sprinkling fertilizer and spraying insecticide. In the years since I've been a staunch advocate for better conditions for farm workers.

I parked fifty yards from the barn. Up ahead a fallen tree blocked a piece of the road, but now that it was dusk I couldn't tell how badly. I climbed out again, but I didn't move closer right away. The house was in sad disrepair, most likely beyond hope of renovation, even if anyone cared enough to try. The barn looked as if it were one puff of wind from collapse.

At one time this barn had been the center of ranch life, home for the horses Jud used for hauling logs and moving cattle from one pasture to another. The chickens were housed here, too, with a fenced coop opening to the outside. The expansive pigpen was attached to the other side of the barn, with separate sections for the boar and for the sows with piglets, as well as an indoor area for shelter and segregating the hogs when the pen was cleaned.

Cecilia was in charge of feeding and cleaning up after the horses and hogs. Jud delighted in making her do the dirtiest chores, and the little Betty said in protest never affected him. Usually, in fact, he suggested that if Betty thought the work was too much for Cecilia, maybe I should take over.

I was terrified of his boar, and of course he knew it. Jud was proud of his black Mulefoots, a unique heritage breed suited to the area. At their peak the hogs might reach weights of more than 600 pounds, and Jud's prize boar had been at least that. The boar was mean tempered and aggressive, but then so was Jud's bull, a speckled black-and-white monster with twisting horns. Armed with a cattle prod, Jud liked to pit himself against both, just to prove he was in charge.

Cecilia used to pray out loud that the bull would gore Jud when nobody else was around to rescue him. I was less vocal. I prayed silently.

Many farmers care about their animals, even if they are raising them to slaughter. They provide the best conditions, sometimes even affection, and do what they can to give them good lives. Jud was not one of them. He enjoyed suffering. He employed the most minimal standards in everything he did, and he had no empathy for any living thing he controlled. No priest will ever convince me that hell exists, but if I'm wrong, I will know where to look for Jud in the afterlife.

I pushed away from the car and hiked to the tree, which was not the roadblock I'd feared. I couldn't believe Cecilia had driven around it, yet she had spent so much of her time with the Osburns in this very place that the possibility existed. I shouted her name and listened, but as before there was no answer. Giving the barn a wide berth I circled it on foot, but no car was parked behind it, and through a gaping hole on one side I could see into the surprisingly solid interior. I was alone here.

For the next half hour, as the sun sank closer to the horizon, I drove what I could of the farm roads, through and around fields overgrown with scrub, more ill-considered groves, along the bank of what had once been a flowing creek. Tire tracks are quickly erased on a sandy roadbed, but I saw no signs any vehicles had been here recently. I ended up on the driveway back to the main road, convinced Cecilia wasn't here and probably hadn't been.

As I was about to start back to Tampa I remembered the only other place where she might have gone, the place she most liked to escape to.

The place that had nurtured and fed her love of music.

At the road I turned west and hoped I would find what I was looking for. Both the place and the sister.

40

Cecilia

Robin and I aren't the only foster children who crossed the cattle guard at the Osburn ranch. Before us Jud and Betty raised four teenage boys. One had “emotional problems,” and to keep him, the Osburns were required to take special training, which also increased their stipend. I can only conclude this area of Florida was so lacking in foster-parent candidates that the state was pathetically grateful to anyone who applied.

Jud once told me that the boys liked the ranch because nobody watched them too closely, and he made sure they got a six-pack on Saturdays if they did a good week's work. Sometimes I wonder what happened to those young men after they turned eighteen and were booted out of care. Maybe Mick will make it his business to find out, but with Jud as their role model, I don't think he'll find them teaching school or preaching the word of God.

God comes to mind because I'm sitting on the steps of what's left of the Cold Creek Mission Church of Christ, down the road from the ranch. I used to come here on Sunday evenings to listen to the choir. At first I stayed outside in the woods, not sure I would be welcome. The congregation was African American, and this area was not noted for integrated worship. After several months I was discovered by an old woman who was late for the service. She spotted me hovering, and when she confronted me I told her the truth. She marched me inside, where I remained.

Attending choir practice was out of the question because on a weeknight I would have needed to explain my absence to the Osburns, who were racist to the core, but when the director heard me singing hymns from the back row she taught me some anthems so I could join in. No lessons I have taken in all my years since have shaped my voice and love of music more than those.

Years have passed since this patch of scrub and sand rang with music, but I can remedy that. “He Will Remember Me” is still one of my favorites.

“When on the cross of Calvary...”

I got almost all the way through to the end without choking up, but I knew I wasn't going to finish. I rested my head in my hands.

A minute later I heard a familiar voice.

“Nobody sings that song better than you.”

I straightened and watched Robin, in jeans and a blue windbreaker, pick her way down the scrub-choked path. I hadn't heard a car, and I didn't see one now. She probably parked beside my rental, hidden in the woods along the road. Sunset was just beginning to tint the sky. In fifteen minutes or less we would be in total darkness.

She joined me on the step, gingerly lowering herself until she was settled. I held my breath in case her weight sent what was left of the rotting boards crashing to the ground, but they held.

This is the time of day photographers call the magic hour. The light is perfect, and Robin usually has a camera in hand, no matter where she is or what's going on around her. Now, though, her hands were empty. There would be no visual record of whatever we said.

She spoke when I didn't. “I wonder what happened here. Where did this congregation go? Did they move? Or lose so many members they just closed the doors one day and walked away?”

“They have a tidy little concrete block building closer to town. Fifty-six members, last time I checked.”

She thought that over. “I wonder how they got that tidy little building.”

“Hard work and prayer.”

“And an anonymous donor?”

“Not me.” I didn't give the congregation money for a new church. When this building reached the point of no return they didn't need a white girl's charity to keep their spirit and faith alive. Of course, in the interest of local education and the preservation of their musical tradition, ten years ago I did set up an annual scholarship. Each June one senior who sings regularly with the Mission Church choir is awarded a four-year scholarship to any Florida university. It's nothing compared to what they did for me.

“I remember coming here with you sometimes,” Robin said. “Sundays. Our day of rest.”

“I used to tell Betty and Jud wild tales about where I was going on Sunday nights. As long as I didn't ask them to take me, they didn't care.”

“By Sunday evening Jud wouldn't have noticed you leaving anyway.”

Jud had rewarded
himself
with end-of-the-week six-packs, too. He'd always indulged somewhere away from the ranch, with somebody other than Betty. That was the only reason I was able to leave Robin behind on the Sunday evenings she didn't want to come here with me.

Since Robin wasn't bringing up the obvious, I did. “Did Donny call you?”

“He's worried.”

I tried not to imagine that. “I left him a note.”

“Right. Something like ‘I need time to think.'”

“I was more gracious than that.”

“Oh, right. ‘
Sorry
. I need time to think.'”

I couldn't argue. Those were my exact words.

“I got his message as I was going through security. When I called he was halfway to frantic. How did you get here?”

“A friend of Sage's with a single-engine plane. He was delighted to make the trip. And Donny should know I would never leave everybody in the lurch without a word.”

“You took
off
without a word. And forget the note, okay? It didn't do much for him.”

“I'm tired of having to account to somebody every minute of my life. I needed time to think. I deserve that, right?”

“Tell me that having somebody to account to is worse than not having anybody who cares. Ever. Want to be in that place again?”

“I always had you.”

She rested her hand on my shoulder for a moment. “Well, here I am again.”

I felt my resistance unwinding. “I know I should have warned him, but this was an impulse. I wanted some time to think about what's coming. Is that hard to understand? Don't you need that, too?”

“Sure, coming back here was on my mind over the holidays.” She paused. “How did yours turn out, by the way?”

“Nice job of sliding into that.”

“Did you see Hayley?”

I glanced at her. “Why?”

“Because I'm your sister and I haven't talked to you since Christmas Eve, when you were pretty evasive.”

I didn't want to talk about the holidays, but while most people think I'm the relentless one, Robin comes in a close second. “She spent the day after Christmas with me at my condo. Roscoe, me...and Donny.”

“Donny spent Christmas with you?”

“He spent it with his family. He flew in on the twenty-sixth.”

“He invited you to go wherever his family lives, and you said no. Am I wrong?”

I didn't answer.

“A little too close for comfort, huh?”

“Things are moving too fast.”

“Says the woman who met Sage Callahan and married him a few months later.”

“And look how well that turned out.”

“CeCe, you didn't
expect
that to turn out. Donny's a different story.”

“You should take up marriage counseling. Just as soon as you get your own in shape.”

“It kind of is.”

I glanced at her. “Really?”

“Kris made some big changes. He apologized for the way he behaved. He even offered to join me here when I need him most.”

“Was it a prelude to sex?”

She poked me with her elbow, and the step squeaked beneath us. “Postcoital pillow talk, if you must know. The apology was genuine.”

“I'm glad.”

“Are you?”

This time I shifted so I could continue to see her face. “What's that supposed to mean?”

“Well, isn't it easier when we're both having problems with the men in our lives?”

“Donny is not the man in my life.”

“But he would be if you'd let him.”

“No, it's not easier. I'm not that selfish.” At least I hoped I wasn't.

“So how did it feel? Hayley, Donny and you. Exchange gifts? Sing Christmas carols? Roast the Christmas goose?”

“Tell me about yours.”

“Tell me about yours
first
,” she corrected. “I told you a bit on the phone. Kris's parents surprised us. Ida gave me gorgeous vintage cookie molds that have been passed down through her family so Pet and I can make authentic bear paws every holiday. Christmas in Chicago was wonderful, although carp for Christmas dinner isn't a custom I intend to follow. Kris took a lot of time off afterward.” She smiled a little. “The highlights. Now it's your turn.”

“Hayley gave me three Christmas ornaments she made in art class at school. All these little beads and tiny narrow ribbons. She's very creative. She and Pet would get along.”

“What did you give her?”

“I had to be careful. But most of the other girls in her house went home to their families, so it only seemed fair she got something nice.”

“And?”

“Purple UGG boots. Shiny bows in the back. She looked at me like I was nuts, and then she wouldn't take them off. I think she's probably sleeping in them at night.”

“Perfect.”

“She was a brat, but not as bad as I expected. She's reading Anne Frank's diary. Remember when you read it?”

“You warned me about the ending. Did you warn her?”

“She read the ending first. Hayley's not a fan of surprises. None of the ones in her life have been good ones.” I didn't like the way that day had ended. “I hated to take her back to CFF, but I don't want her to get the wrong idea.”

“Or the right one?”

I ignored that. “She and Donny got along. He's good with her. He doesn't react at the most outrageous things she says, but he gives her all kinds of attention when she's being appropriate.”

“Does he give you attention when you're being appropriate?”

“So few chances.”

“He stayed with you?”

“I have plenty of room.” I shifted just enough that we were almost eye to eye. “We aren't sleeping together. Is that what you want to know?”

“Of course I want to, but it's none of my business.”

“My reputation is a lot more exciting than I am. He's going to be disappointed, and the minute he is, our working relationship will be over.”

“What part of that do I address first?”

“No part. Please.”

She frowned. Then she shrugged.

“It was all so normal, Robin. You know? Like people all over the world. The three of us laughing, getting dinner together, opening gifts. Donny found 78s of all the old songs I want to record and some other good possibilities besides. I don't know how he did it, but now I have a stack to listen to and one of the original Gramophones to play them.”

“It's normal to be with people you care about.”

“I don't care about that many.”

“You tell yourself that.”

“I care about you.” I realized this was the right time to set the record straight. “I care enough that I have to tell you something. Something about the years we lived here. That's one of the things I needed to come here to think about.”

Robin went very still, as if she was steeling herself for a blow. She was just fourteen when we left this place, but I know she remembers a lot.

“Did you ever wonder how we ended up at the Osburn ranch?”

“The Davises told the agency we were close and should be kept together. That's what I remember.”

“It's true as far as it goes.” I stared into the woods again. “But most of the time the foster care system doesn't even keep
biological
siblings together. A lot of the time brothers and sisters are separated. Sometimes they don't see each other again until they're adults, although I think that's changing. They try harder now.”

“They certainly need to.”

“But even now they don't place unrelated girls as far apart in age as we are in the same home. The only reason we were together in the first place was because we both needed a therapeutic home and the rules were different.”

She absorbed that. “What I
do
remember about those days is that a lot of things were unusual. Good foster homes were hard to find. Rules were stretched and broken.”

“Yeah, they were.” The light wasn't going to last much longer, and we had to walk back to our cars. I was sorry I had started this part of the conversation, but there was no way she would let me stop now.

“Do you remember Nathan Johnson? He was Mr. Johnson to us.”

“One of our caseworkers?”

“Right. He was the one who placed us with the Osburns.”

She raised a hand high over her head in illustration. “The tall one, right? Skinny and tall. When he wasn't around you called him Ichabod.”

“Yeah, that's the one.”

“What about him?”

“One night when we were still living with the Davises, I heard them talking. I got up to go the bathroom or get a drink. I don't remember, but they were talking in low voices. Low voices mean secrets. By then I knew secrets were useful.”

“Ammunition?”

“If needed, and
only
if needed. You would be amazed at the secrets I've kept about friends in the music biz. Things the world would love to know and doesn't deserve to.”

She knew I was delaying the inevitable. “The light's fading. What did you hear that night?”

“That Mr. Johnson had been accused of molesting one of the girls on his caseload. The girl herself accused him. He was suspended while the state investigated, but there was no proof, just the girl's word, and nobody thought she was trustworthy. Some of what she said didn't add up. Nobody else on his caseload came forward. So he was reinstated. But the Davises found out. That night they were discussing how to be certain he was never alone with either of us. They thought he wasn't guilty, but they wanted to protect us, just in case.”

“They loved us.”

“They sent us away.” I held up my hand. “I know. They had no choice. But that's still what I remember.”