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It was the fourth night that week that Rachel woke Jordan with her screaming.
The middle Berenson daughter pulled her pillow over her head, mashing her ear between its softness and the mattress. She bit her lip hard, hoping the pain would cut through the sound of Rachel's animalistic shrieks, but it did no good.
It never did.
How long had this been going on? Nine months? A year? It was hard to remember when, exactly, nighttime had turned into hell.
The worst part was that Jordan was alone in this. Mom slept like the dead on the other side of their house; two glasses of wine unwisely mixed with some melatonin; her eye-mask and earplugs completing the look. And little Sara wasn't much better; with her white-noise machine endlessly droning, she kept a tight hold on dreamland until her Pokémon alarm clock signaled the start of a new day.
It was Jordan alone who witnessed her sister's inexplicable torment. Who heard her screaming between the hours of two and four; wailing like the bad guy in that movie Jordan wasn't supposed to watch stood at her bed, slipping his knife shallowly beneath her skin to peel it off in pink paper-mâché strips.
It would've almost been better if that were the case. If it was a real bad guy hurting her sister like that, then Jordan could've run in with her hockey stick; could swing away and cave that sucker's head right in. She could be the hero, daring-true; could hold her sister tight and roar like a lion, challenging anyone else to rob her peace.
But there was no bad guy; nobody to defeat with the power of love and hockey sticks. There was nothing but her sister's own mind, killing her slowly from the inside out. Somehow, between one September and the next, Rachel had Changed.
"It's just puberty, sweetie," Mom had dismissed when Jordan tried to explain how Rachel was always gone nowadays, always off with her friends. How she snuck out and came back Different. Uninjured on the outside, beautiful as ever, but destroyed inside; eyes hollow. How Rachel's patience had frayed feather-thin, crumbling at the seams until the most insignificant thing would set her off like a bomb.
Before this year, Jordan had never been afraid of her sister.
Now, Jordan warned Sara to hush up when Rachel was home. Not to annoy her with chatter or cartoons. Never to eat her leftovers. Never to question her or look at her funny. They'd had too many close calls, with Rachel rounding on her sisters like she wanted to hit them; hurt them. Like she hated them, to the bottom of her broken heart.
"No!" Rachel screamed, her voice carrying through the air vents that connected her room with Jordan's. She was pleading, tears and rage and blood in her voice. "No, let him go; don't — you can't! I'll kill you if you—"
A pause. A moment's silence. Then, so shattered and raw, it must surely shred her throat: "JAKE!"
Jordan thought of their cousin; that fun, big boy with the puppy-dog grin, always so good to the younger kids. To her. Was he the victim in Rachel's dreams… Or the villain?
What did he do to you, Rach?
Rachel's bedroom door burst open with a gunshot's bang, bouncing off the opposite wall. She sprinted for the bathroom, and Jordan froze in ice-blooded fear… The sound of Rachel's footsteps was Very Wrong. There were too many feet, landing like hooves or paws as they raced at breakneck speed past Jordan's bedroom. Either Jordan had gone utterly insane, or this was for-real happening… And Jordan couldn't decide which of the two was worse.
Jordan seized the teddy that Daddy'd given her last Hanukkah; the sky-blue bear with the kind button eyes. She squeezed it to her chest, both afraid and ashamed of being afraid. The muffled sounds of Rachel puking into the toilet made her cringe.
A silence followed, every bit as loud as the screams. She listened to Rachel rinsing her mouth at the sink. The tap of her hairbrush hitting the counter. She could picture it clear as a program on TV: Rachel straightening her pajamas. Washing her face. Brushing her hair and arranging it into that long blonde braid. Every movement cemented her control, transforming herself from the terrified (and terrifying) night creature to the iconic Rachel Berenson: daughter, sister, student, gymnast. Within a minute, she would be her old self again…
Her old self to everyone but Jordan, that is. A mother might mistake what's happening for simple puberty, but a sister always, always knows.
Rachel returns to her room on two feet; not four. No hooves. She shuts her door. Jordan listens to her strip the sweat-soaked sheets and re-make the bed, and then she hears the window creak open as Rachel prepares to let herself out, going off to God-knows-where, like she always does.
Jordan waits until the silence becomes a solid weight before slipping out of bed; before following the path Rachel took to her bedroom. It feels too weird to turn the overhead light on; to break the night with such harshness, so she clicks on the string lights that surround Rachel's vanity mirror, instead; letting them illuminate the space with their soft white glow.
Aside from the messy bed, the space is tidy. Rachel has always been efficient and organized, her space matching her personality. Books are lined on shelves according to height. Clothes are grouped by type, then color.
The window is open, and Jordan crosses the room to close it… Then stops herself. How will Rachel sneak back in? But then, how did she sneak out to begin with? Their rooms are on the second storey, and there is no convenient Romeo-and-Juliet trellis to climb…
She is tempted to shut and latch the window anyway. Make Rachel come to the front door. Make her knock. Make her explain to Mom where she was; what she was doing.
Sibling loyalty stills her hand. Isn't that the unspoken law of sisterhood? Thou must not get thine siblings into trouble?
But does that rule even apply when said sibling is already getting herself into trouble; maybe very, very bad trouble? The maybe-gonna-die kind of trouble?
Jordan hesitates. Shifts her weight from foot to foot, chewing her nails in indecision. This can't go on, and she knows it. Whatever is making Rachel scream like the house is on fire, night after night after night… It's bad, right? Really, really bad?
Jordan doesn't want to be a coward. But inside her heart is nothing but the cold, misty fear of the unknown. It's a big sister's job to protect the little sister, but Jordan doesn't feel very protected at all; not anymore. Monsters have arrived at her door, and they're all dying to burst in.
In the end, Jordan leaves the window be.
She crosses to Rachel's bed and straightens the sweat-slick sheets; the pillows. She finds Rachel's teddy, who appears to have both its arms ripped off, and sets it in the corner.
Then she curls up at the foot of the bed, eyes on the window, watching and waiting for her Rachel to return. Already fatigue is tugging at her lids, but she fights valiantly to keep them wide. To be anchor and lighthouse both; beckoning her sister's safe return.
After all, that's what sisters do.