My Sister Is Wasted Potential

My sister is wasted potential.

“Shit.” She muttered, frowning at her emptied bottle of foundation. She came into the kitchen and dumped it in the bin, and when she looked at me I already knew what she was going to say. “I don’t suppose you have any foundation I could borrow, Sky?” I let her say it anyway.

“Sure.” I smiled. “I’ll go and get it.” I put my script down and stood up from the table, ignoring my brother’s eye-roll as I passed him. I quickly retreated to the bedroom that my sister and I shared and picked up my foundation from where I left it on my bed before heading back and giving it to her. “Might be a bit pale for you, though.” I commented after she’d thanked me.

“Doesn’t matter.” She shook her head. “Just as long as I don’t have to go to work bare-faced.” She threw over her shoulder as she went back to the mirror in the hallway.

“Why are girls so obsessed with make-up?” Caine asked, rolling his eyes again.

“You want a long answer or a short one?” I retaliated, my eyes scanning over my script for the millionth time, finding the highlighted lines that I needed to commit to memory.

“Short.” He demanded, predictably, with his mouth full of cereal. I’d had a witty response lined up but by the time he’d answered, my train of thought had already moved on.

I tore off the crust of my toast and tossed it at him. “It’s not about her being obsessed with make-up, dickwad.” It hit the collar of his shirt before falling into his opened and waiting palm. “It’s because she works in a salon.” I told him as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, though I knew he wouldn’t get it. I watched him dip the crust in the left over milk of his finished Cheerio’s before taking a bite.

“So?” He shook his head.

“So, people aren’t going to want me to do their make-up if I can’t even put make-up on myself, are they?” Celeste called from the hallway.

“Oh, right. Gotcha.” He nodded, and proceeded to enjoy his milk-and-toast combination.

“And that bottle costs eight quid, I’m not going to be able to afford another one at least until the end of the month.” I heard her say, more quietly – as if she wasn’t expecting anyone to hear.

“Nick some from work.” I offered a solution that I though was entirely rational, but she gave me this look, this mixture of disappointment and contempt that I was all too familiar with. She’d learnt that look from our mum. I have many memories of them both turning their nose up at me like that in unison.

“Skylar Alexander.” She sighed, shaking her head. She’d learnt that from mum too. In fact, whilst she stood silhouetted in that hallway, her blonde hair grazing her waist and her face, although turned half away from me, still showing a trace of that scorn, she could almost be mistaken for our mother. People always said Celeste was the spitting image of our mum, and I never disagreed, but sometimes there would just be moments like this when it would hit me how true that statement really was.

Since our parents’ death almost five months ago, these moments seemed to hit me with alarming frequency.

“Caine, get in the car, I’ll be out in a sec.” She commanded as she teased her hair into a ponytail. He stood up immediately, picking his school bag up off the floor and swinging it over his shoulder.

“Caine. Bowl.” I pointed. “Sink.”

He obediently put his bowl and spoon in the sink, took the car keys from Celeste and left the flat. Since he’d started year ten in September he’d developed a habit of bunking lessons. My psychiatrist said it was typical of kids who’d suffered a loss like ours. Celeste said it was stupid and that he was throwing away his future, and that from now on she’d be driving him to school every day and keeping in close contact with his teachers.

I think she took her new ‘mother role’ a bit too seriously. Not the she’d ever been too close to Caine and me to start out with. She was the first born child, the trail blazer that left footsteps for the two of us to stumble after. My God did we struggle. Celeste could do no wrong – she had the right grades, the right attitude, the right look – just the right everything - whilst Caine and I bonded over our academic mediocrity and penchant for practical joking and making a mess. Don’t get me wrong, our parents loved us all the same… but Celeste elicited a sense of pride in them that neither I nor Caine ever achieved.

“Right, I’m off. Make sure you get to college on time, missy.” She ordered, heels clacking on the wooden panels of the floor as she reached for the front door.

“Wait!” I jumped up, knocking the table so that a splash of Caine’s untouched orange juice jumped the lip of the glass and formed a small puddle on the mottled surface. She looked at me expectantly. “It’s Caine’s birthday tomorrow.”

“I know.” She shook her head, the impatience clear in her voice.

“So… Do we have anything-?”

“Skylar, I don’t have time for this.” She reprimanded, opening the door.

“But-”

“Skylar! I’ll figure it out, okay?”

“Sure.” I backed down, but she was already closing the door behind her.

I slowly sank back down into my chair and listened to the now-muffled heel-clacks retreat down the hall, towards the tower block’s elevator. Off she went to work in Mum’s best friend’s beauty parlour when she should have been building an impressive portfolio at London College of Fashion. She’d had a place secured. She’d passed her A-levels no problem. She’d been all set to move to London with her two friends, Mae and Atara, and get her degree in ‘Creative Direction for Fashion’ as she so excitedly repeated to anyone who would listen. But then, of course, our parents died.

I finished my breakfast half-heartedly and quickly did the dishes before it was time to leave for college. November brought a crisp and cold wind with it, and I was grateful for the plush trench coat I’d forked out for back in January. I was also grateful for how quickly my bus arrived after I’d made it to the bus stop.

I hopped on, finding only one seat remained empty; a seat beside none other than Isaac Lane. I knew Celeste would be mad if I didn’t even try to pretend I hadn’t noticed him, but his eyes caught mine immediately, as if he’d seen me standing at the bus stop through the window, so there was no point in not sitting beside him.

“Alright, Cabbage Patch Kid.”  He smirked. He half raised his hand as if to pinch my cheek, the way he always used to whenever he’d come over, but seemed to realise half way through the action that it would’ve been the worst idea ever, and ran the gloved hand through his mousey curls instead.

“You know full well you lost the right to call me that five months ago.” I chided him, lifting my eyes haughtily away from his own brown ones.

“But you still have those chubby cheeks that earned you the nickname in the first place.” He pointed out, his smirk lingering a while longer before falling to a contemplative frown. “Has it really been five months?” He asked softly.

“Almost.” I responded, pursing my lips.

“How are you holding up?” He enquired, leaning his head forward and trying to make eye contact, which I refused.

“I’m fine.” I snapped. “She’s fine. Caine’s fine. We’re a family of fighters.”

He let his head fall back again, his eyes skirting over to the fogged window. “Yeah, I know damn well you are.” He breathed, wiping his clothed knuckles against the condensation on the glass. I don’t know why, but as the bus turned a corner and the light changed to dapple the freckles that clustered on his cheeks and crossed his nose, I almost felt a pang in my chest of what might have been pity for him.

There was nothing he had done, or had had done to him that constituted my pity. He was Celeste’s ex. They had been together for four years, and a week after we had become orphans he’d decided that the pressure of having a grieving girlfriend who was no longer on her way to becoming an icon in the fashion industry was too much and dumped her.

I sat up abruptly. “You’re supposed to be in London.” I looked at him. “Training to be a doctor or something.” I narrowed my eyes, eyebrows drawing together. I remembered that he and Celeste planned to journey to London together, and rent different apartments a few streets away from one another.

He regarded me for a moment and I couldn’t read his expression. “Yeah. Well. Things change. You know that.” He said shortly. “And I was going to be a vet, actually.”

“Whatever, it’s still a type of doctor.” I muttered, raising my eyebrows and crossing my arms as I turned away from him. “So what are you still doing in Bristol?” I demand, unable to quell my curiosity.

“You always were a nosey little shit, weren’t you?” He commented, not unkindly, but I still took offence. “Anyway, this is my stop, Cabbage Patch.” He nodded as the bus lurched to a halt. “Stay out of trouble.” He warned as he climbed out of his seat, and there was a strange note to his tone that sounded a little too serious.

“You too.” I retaliated wearily. “And don’t go breaking any more hearts now, will you?” I added, a little bit of spite seeping into my voice.

But he just laughed at that. “Celeste is not the type to suffer from a broken heart.” He smiled confidently. “Like you said yourself, you’re a family of fighters.”

 

Saffy Parkar - Author