My sister is 5 years older than me. My sister was the golden child, the pride and the prize of our family until 7 years ago. At the top of her career and what everyone would consider the peak success of one’s life in all aspects, my sister attempted to kill herself. Multiple times.
My sister was dressy, highly disciplined and head strong. My sister would never be seen unkempt, upset or without a bright smile on her face until she came home one day, locked herself in a room for days without food or drinks. When my rightfully hysterical mother finally broke into the room with the help of a locksmith, my sister was lying so still, so still in her own sweat and waste.
We sought help. All the tests came back normal. But my sister is now home-bound. She stopped talking, she stopped having friends, a job, a hobby. Days and nights become the same for her. She just stopped.
Saying the following years were hard on the family, especially my mom is an understatement. I will spare the details, the cycles that we went through for her, grieving the loss of her to accepting that she is still here - alive, existing but void of any traces of a life lived.
We were a large and close knit family. My parents have multiple siblings. We have several cousins. We were all close in spirits and even in living distance to each other. It broke the entire family apart, debating and arguing how to proceed with my sister’s condition.
Some strongly urged my sister to seek and follow through with psychiatric help. Some thought prayers would be the cure - we are also a devoutly religious family. Some went with the good ol “just put on your big girl panties and deal with life” approach. Some eventually, me included, got tired of the turmoil and retreated from the debate after a while. It was always good to stay in the shadow, speaking up was always irrelevant when it was regarding my sister. I learned it quickly growing up.
My sister is not doing well. But recently, nobody believes me when I say it any more. It started when we stopped trying with treatments, prayers, medication, and any sort of professional help. My sister is alive, and that’s enough for us to go through this new reality every day, one day at a time. She eventually was doing well.
But my sister is not doing well.
Living in another city, I would visit them home every couple months or so - out of duties, and out of caving in to the countless calls and voicemails my mom sent. I found the lock on my bedroom door destroyed during one of my home visit. I didn’t think much of it, I would only spend a night or two there anyway. I woke up that night to see my sister standing in the doorway, staring at me in my bed. I sat up and asked if everything was alright, she stared at me unblinking, tears formed and fell from her wild open eyes. I got up to get to the light. When it was on, she had been gone.
My mom said firmly when I told her in the morning.
Later that night, I blocked my door with a chair. I woke up to light knocks on the windows. My sister was hanging outside my window, her face pressed to the glass, eyes bulging, her fingers make rapid taps on the glass. My bedroom is on the second floor of the house. She would have had to climb up from the ground or from the other side of the house. I stared back at her, tapping on my windows, that stupid grin on her face. Like the stupid faces she made when we were kids and she was taunting me to rile me up. Except, we were both in our 30s now, and she was hanging on my window sill on all four in the middle of the night. I looked at her body bent in all the weird way, shaking from holding onto the window. I felt sick, I felt terrified. I also felt like opening the window and pushing her to fall off of it.
She’s is not fucking well.
Another visit, I went out to our front yard, chugging some beers late at night, thinking of how fucked everything had turned out. Being at home is always a good reminder of that. Every visit, my mother had aged a little more, and my sister had regressed a little more. I opened another can and out the corner of my eyes, I saw my sister crouching down under one of the sun chair, staring at me, that crazy unblinking stare. I jumped. And watched her scuttled away into the house. I heard her cackling as her footsteps retreating upstairs.
My mom asked, almost delighted when I told her the next morning.
Then she came up with the idea we should have movie night together. I obliged, as I always did when she asked. My mom fell asleep, snoring soundly 10 minutes into the movie on the couch. I was laying next to my sister on the mattress we had pulled into the living room on the floor, eyes to the screen waiting for this romcom to put me to sleep. My sister had been laying still this whole time, curled up, her back to me. I felt her body shaking and asked if she was cold. She didn’t move or reply, I reached over to pull the cover up to her. Then I saw that she was shaking holding in a fit of laughter. Her eyes rolled all the way to the side to look me.
I blurted and punched her shoulder. I felt rage, an unreasonable massive amount of rage, and fear. I yanked her towards me, shoved her around on that mattress. I wanted her to stop that crazed wide stare and the stupid laughter. Then I saw it in her clenched hand. She was holding a pair my mom’s sewing scissors. And I smacked her in the face. The laughter didn’t stop, so I socked her, hard, in the face repeatedly.
My mom woke up screaming, clutching my sister and screaming at me to stop. I was so fucking done. I was done explaining. I slept in the guest room, door locked twice, for the rest of that night. After that night, nothing I said about her was relevant any more. I stopped going home. Face time would do for checking on my mom. Even then, I would see my sister popping up in and out from the back of my mom, that stupid toothy smile on her face. I would hang up, telling my mom never worked. She would say I just made up things. And we were strained after I gave her sick daughter cuts and bruises all over the face for “no reason” during our movie night.
My sister died, a year later. My mom sent a text. “Come home. The funeral is on Sunday.”
I stood on the side through all the proceedings. The family came, grieved. At least she is well now they all said.
But my sister is not doing well, because as I drive back to the city, she is sitting in the passenger seat with that taunting grin and stupid muffled cackle, staring at me. Make her stop.