Between the Spirit and the Dust

Chapter Twenty Four

That night, for the first time in a long time, I dreamt of Sylvia. 

She was standing next to the shopping carts. We were in the our old neighbourhood grocery store and she was busy studying a piece of paper and muttering under her breath to herself. Finally she looked up and saw me and went, “Finally! You managed to find a parking lot? Let me guess, it was the parallel parking that took you so long.”

I could only stare at her mutely, mentally comparing the changes between this Sylvia and the one that I’d last seen two years ago. This Sylvia was the one I knew growing up, who’d rehearsed the songs for her senior year spring musicals until I’d barged into her room asking her to shut up. This Sylvia was wearing her favorite pair of cutoff shorts, her hair tied in a loose braid and so alive that it took my breath away. 

But she was gone. How could she be here at the same time?

“Here take this,” she continued, passing me the paper she had been staring at.“I’m going to just grab one of these carts, gimme a minute.”

I took a quick glance at it. Eggs, tampons, Mum’s favorite granola... As Sylvia picked up one of the carts, I finally realized where we were and what we were supposed to be doing here.

This was our typical Thursday night. Ever since Sylvia got her driving license, our parents had gone for their date nights on Thursdays, leaving us to do the grocery shopping for the week. And when I got my license, Sylvia made me do all the driving.

Thursday nights were our nights. No matter how busy we both were, we always made it a point to hang out on those nights, to talk about all the things that had happened that week. Sylvia would gossip about the boys that she had to practice kissing with and the drama from the theater geeks and I’d talked about the kids in my year and what plans my friends and I had made that week.

This was before I was the Dead Girl’s Sister. Before she’d gone off for college and before she had even met Gabriel St. Clair.

Clearing her throat, Sylvia said, “Alright, so where should we start, first Emmy? Where do you want to go? 

Startled, I picked a random item. “Um, I guess we could get the tampons first?” 

Sylvia nodded, humming under breath, and we headed off for the aisle. I vaguely recognized the song that she was humming but more importantly, I was shocked at how I’d forgotten how I’d forgotten all these small things about her. Like how she had always been a few inches shorter than me and had never failed to remind me that it had to be because I used to steal her milk when we were younger. Or how she had that small star-shaped freckle at the corner of her left eye. Or how her voice sounded when she was happy, that bouncy upbeat tone.

How had I forgotten all these things about her? 

“What’s wrong?” asked Sylvia, stopping suddenly and frowning at me. “You’ve been giving me that weird look the whole time. And I know you’re usually pretty quiet but you’re acting really weird." 

Opening my mouth, I tried to find the words to explain what I was feeling but I couldn’t. On the outside, I might’ve looked like my sister but we were two completely different people. She could be brusque, cutting all the bullshit to the point of coming off as rude. I’d never had her guts or her ability to jump fearlessly into things. 

“Well?” she pressed.

I’d spent most of my life being defined as Sylvia Wilkins’ younger sister, the one who was less outgoing and less popular but I’d never minded because I loved my sister. And I figured that I owed her as much to tell her what was on my mind.