There was some kind of agreement between Patrice and Gwen. It had never been defined. Nothing was ever signed or even discussed. Perhaps neither of them really understood the terms to which they had both somehow been adhering to for thirteen years but the two sisters had stayed away from each other all that time, so the agreement was working.
Patrice’s daughter, Ali, had no recollection of her Aunt Gwen, who she had last seen when she was three years old. Ali had lots of family on her father’s side. There were aunts, uncles and cousins that she saw regularly and there were other relatives who were distant mostly because of geography. So it was not odd to her that her mom and dad had no contact with her Aunt Gwen. She knew that her aunt lived somewhere nearby but she put her into that category of distant relatives. The category of “estranged relatives” did not exist as far as Ali knew but that is the exact place where Gwen belonged and she was all alone in that space.
So the agreement between Patricia and Gwen was still firmly in place the day that Ali unknowingly showed up on Gwen’s doorstep. She was there responding to an online “for sale” post. Gwen opened the front door, handed Ali the keys to her black VW Jetta and without any introduction, the two of them went for a test drive.
“Sixty-two thousand miles is low for a seven-year-old car,” Gwen explained to the sixteen-year-old girl who was buying her first car.
“Any idiosyncrasies?” Ali asked.
“What do you mean?” Gwen asked.
“Any finicky behavior about the car that I should know about? Little secrets?” Gwen pursed her lips, shrugged her shoulders and said,
“No. Nothing I can think of.” She paused. “Nothing you couldn’t figure out.” Gwen had no idea who the girl was sitting next to her, driving her car. It was only when they went to the notary public to fill out the paperwork to transfer the title that Gwen realized that her little niece, Allison Roberts, had reappeared into her life. Upon that discovery, she said nothing. She reached into her coat pocket to grab her cell phone and then excused herself to step outside.
“Excuse me, I have to take this,” she said. There was no phone call. She stepped into the crisp October day, squinted up at the sky and breathed in and out for a full minute. She wanted to go back inside and hug the little girl who had grown into an elegant, confident woman. But Gwen had to adhere to that agreement. To violate it would be like claiming that gravity does not pertain to all things. That the two sisters had no contact was like a law of physics. It was no longer a choice as it had been at one time. Now it was nature simply doing what it was meant to do. But at that moment, Gwen wanted so badly to break that law and reconnect with her beautiful, innocent niece who had done nothing to cause the rift between her mother and aunt but who, in Gwen’s opinion, had suffered by not having her aunt in her life all those years.
Ali was twelve when she first asked her mother about her Aunt Gwen; nine years after she had last seen her. Gwen’s name came up when Ali’s dad was trying to remember when his brother got married. Ali was nearby listening.
“Oh Tom, It had to be before that since Gwen must have still been living in Phoenix when they got married,” Patrice said. “She wasn’t at the wedding, and she would have certainly gone if she hadn’t been living so far away.” Ali had no memory of her aunt even though she had seen her nearly every week from the time she was born until age three. Aunt Gwen was just a name Ali heard her mom or dad mention from time to time.
“Why don’t we ever see her?” Ali asked. Patrice glanced towards the kitchen window and Ali’s dad shuffled his feet. Patrice moved the pan of shrimp that she was simmering and turned off the burner. She sat down at the glass kitchen table. Ali’s father left the room and Ali sat down across from her mother. Patrice then told her daughter the same story she had told everyone. She explained that nine years ago, the two sisters and their brother went to New York City with their mother.
“Grandma wanted a long weekend with her kids for her birthday,” Patrice explained. “Your uncle wanted to see a Ranger’s game. Grandma and I wanted to see a Broadway play. Aunt Gwen wanted to shop. I knew a charming, cozy restaurant in Little Italy. Gwen wanted to go somewhere for sushi. There was some jazz quintet playing in Central Park that grandma wanted to see Saturday afternoon, but Gwen insisted on going to some art gallery. Grandma wanted to go to mass at St. Patrick’s cathedral Sunday morning, but Aunt Gwen wanted to go to brunch. Your uncle and grandma and I were all very flexible and willing to compromise on everything. But Gwen insisted on getting her way all the time. She would get upset and we would give in. But it got to the point where the three of us had to stand our ground and explain to Gwen that the vote was three to one and majority rules. She screamed at us about having never gotten her way her entire life, which isn’t true. She said something about having been dragged to come along her whole life as the baby of the family. Not accurate. Anyway, she packed her suitcase and flew home by herself when we still had two days left on our trip”
This was the same explanation Patrice gave to everyone………except her husband. He knew that there was more to it than this. But everyone else including Ali bought this story. They had no reason to not believe it. The four of them did have their differences that weekend and Gwen was being insistent and uncompromising. She did leave everyone and went back home mad.
After Gwen was gone, her mother said to Patrice, “That’s who your sister is. She hates to see you get your way.” Patrice just nodded and went about drying her hair in front of the bathroom mirror. Her mother was standing behind her. “She hated to see you with Tom.” Patrice turned off the hair dryer, turned around and looked at her mother.
Tom and Patrice were twenty-three when they first started dating. After they had been together about a month, Patrice’s mother told Tom one time when they were alone that Gwen had a crush on him. She was chopping onions in the kitchen with her back turned towards Tom. He was sitting nearby husking corn. Tom dismissed it as harmless and didn’t think it was unusual behavior for an eighteen-year-old to be curious about her big sister’s boyfriend. He had not seen any signs of Gwen having any interest in him. Regardless of whether or not it was true, he wasn’t sure why Patrice’s mother was telling him this. He let out a nervous laugh to show his lack of concern. He wanted to change the subject but Patrice’s mother continued.
“She told me.” Tom was too uncomfortable to reply. He was trying to think of something to say to divert their conversation, but she continued. “She told me how much she likes you. Do you think Gwen is cute?”
***
Patrice took a towel and walked from the bathroom into the hotel room that she and her mother were sharing. She started rubbing her wet hair with the towel and said, “What do you mean she hated to see me with Tom?”
“She had a crush on him.”
“What makes you think that?”
“She told me.”
“Well I’m sure she got over it.”
“Eventually, yes”
“What’s that mean?”
“Tom knew that Gwen liked him.”
“So?”
“Well we don’t know what happened.” Patrice tossed the towel on the bed, stood up and walked to the closet. Her mother was standing in the middle of the room with her hands on her hips. Patrice pulled out a royal blue dress still on its hanger. She felt her temples tighten and when she spoke, she noticed notes of tension in her voice.
“What are you saying Alice?” She regretted that she had called her by her name since that revealed her annoyance. She wanted to show her mother nothing but calm and hide the anxiety that had surfaced.
When Tom first learned twenty years earlier that Gwen was interested in him, his only concern was why Alice was telling him that. Tom became even more confused that day about her intentions when she asked him,
“Do you think Gwen is cute?’ He didn’t know if it was a trick. He thought she was perhaps testing his loyalty to Patrice. He didn’t answer her. Part of him questioned whether or not Alice approved of him. He wondered if she thought he didn’t deserve Patrice but maybe she thought he would be good enough for her other daughter. That was the end of their conversation that day.
He started looking for signs from Gwen that she had any interest in him but found nothing. He continued to date Patrice and two years later they married. His relationship with his sister-in-law was fine until that day when Patrice came home from that New York weekend and told him that her mother had possibly implied that something had happened between her sister and husband.
He explained that there had never been anything between him and Gwen and as far as he could tell, his wife believed him. But from that moment on, Patrice ostracized Gwen. Gwen reached out many times with text messages and voicemails apologizing for her behavior that weekend in New York. Patrice never spoke to her again and stuck with her story that Gwen had walked out on her family without ever making any effort later to reconcile
Within a few weeks, their brother did patch things up with Gwen and so did their mother. But Patrice told her husband and the rest of the family that Gwen refused to take her phone calls. It wasn’t true. Her mother and brother stayed out of the matter. Just like Patrice and Gwen, they accepted the fissure between them as a fate of nature over which they had no control.
After many months of trying to mend her relationship with Patrice, Gwen resigned herself to losing her sister, Tom and her niece. Since that break, whatever news Gwen had about those three, she learned from her brother and mother. She knew that Ali was a good student and played on the volleyball team. But that was about all she knew about her niece. Gwen had only seen a few photos of Ali over those thirteen years, which is why she did not recognize her when she showed up at her front door.
Ali never saw any photos of her aunt and didn’t recognize the married last name she was using when she signed the title transfer of her car. Gwen had very vivid memories of wearing fancy hats with Ali at their make-believe tea parties. She often tucked her in and told her stories of handsome princes, mischievous fairies and scary wolves. She had built numerous tall towers with her out of wooden blocks of various colors and carried her around the mall on her back many times. Now she was standing next to her in the notary’s office taking a check from her hand.
“Are you sure there’s nothing you want to tell me?” Ali asked.
“What?”
“About the car. Anything at all?” Gwen was smiling at her with a loving warmth that unsettled Ali a bit.
“No,” she replied. Gwen fought the desire to tell her. She was dying to start fresh and play a new role as the aunt of her adolescent niece. Images went through her head of sitting together in coffee shops and bars giving Ali advice about boyfriends and helping her shop for clothes and makeup.
But there was that agreement, bigger than the people affected by it. It was not a deal that anyone had constructed. There had been no negotiations. It was something that seemed to have manifested on its own and Gwen had no choice but to accept it. Ali held out her hand. Gwen shook it. Ali turned to walk out the door. Gwen said, “Good luck” and then shouted, “Wait.” Ali turned around. “You have to give me a ride home. Is that OK. Can you do that?”
“Sure,” Ali replied with a smile. Gwen caught herself heading towards the driver’s side, stopped and jumped into the passenger seat. Ali took a deep breath, looked at Gwen and before she drove away said, “Here we go.”
*****
Garvin Livingston has written three novels and numerous short stories. His most recent stories have appeared in 2023 and 2024 in Bull Magazine, The Raven Review, Opiate Magazine, The Courtship of Winds, October Hill Magazine, Bridge Eight and MOIRA Literary Magazine. He holds an MA from the University of Pennsylvania.
