The Story Sisters. Alice Hoffman

GATHERED IN ragged groups outside the Plaza, hailing cabs, wondering how the day had gone so wrong. Annie and the girls’ grandmother raced to the line of carriage horses. When they explained to a policeman what had happened, he quickly called for a squad car. Everything seemed to be going at a different speed. Time was in fast-forward. At least the other girls were safe, running over to their mother and grandmother at the entrance into the park. Meg looked pale, but there was bright color in Elv’s cheeks.

      When the police cruiser pulled up, Meg got in alongside her grandmother. She felt irresponsible and scared. She should have watched over Claire. Something had gone terribly wrong and she hadn’t done a thing to help.

      Elv came to stand beside the squad car. There was green pollen in her hair. She looked shimmery and hot. Everything she touched smelled burned, like marshmallows held too long over a bonfire. “I hope that driver gets put in jail for a thousand years,” she said. Her voice was powerful, as though she were reciting a curse.

      Annie felt a chill. Elv was always at the center of things, gathering the other girls around her. “Whose idea was this? Yours?”

      Elv narrowed her green eyes. “It was animal cruelty.”

      “Get in the car,” Annie told her. “We don’t have time to discuss it.”

      Elv climbed into the back of the police car, sitting in the middle beside her sister, so crammed in she was practically on Meg’s lap. The cruiser took off through the park, siren blaring. All the windows were rolled down. The wind whipped through with such force that it stung. Elv wished they could go even faster. She liked the way her heart felt, thumping against her chest. As for Meg, she kept her fingers crossed and held her head down. She said a silent prayer. She couldn’t bear for anything bad to happen to Claire, who always put others first, even an old horse she’d never seen before.

      Midway through the park they spied the horse, galloping at full speed. He didn’t look old, like skin and bones. He looked as if nothing could stop him. A patrol car was racing alongside of him, keeping pace. An officer who was a marksman took a shot from the window of the car. One shot and the horse stumbled. Another, and he fell with a crash. The carriage went up and nearly vaulted over him before it stopped, shuddering. For Claire, it was like a ride at an amusement park, one where your heart is in your throat, only this time it stayed there. She was afraid that if she opened her mouth her heart would fall onto the grass. She was still holding the reins. Both of her arms were broken. She didn’t know that yet. She was in shock. She didn’t see the horse anymore. Maybe he had gone on running. Perhaps he’d had made it to the reservoir and was drinking cool green water. But when Claire pulled herself up, she glimpsed the heap on the ground in front of her. She was fairly certain she could see his chest moving up and down. She thought he might still be alive, but she was mistaken.

      The officers from three squad cars came racing over. Claire still wouldn’t let go of the reins. An ambulance had pulled up and one of the EMT crew members came to talk to her. “Just let me unwrap them,” he said. He would be careful, he promised, and it wouldn’t hurt. But Claire shook her head. She knew it would hurt. She could still hear the clattering sound of the racing carriage through the quiet. She would hear it for a long time. A dappled light came through the trees and spread like lace along the ground. She smelled something hot and thick. Even though she’d never breathed in that scent before, she knew it was blood.

      The girls’ mother and grandmother were ushered from the police cruiser to the fallen carriage. The other Story sisters were told to stay where they were. They were too young to see what was before them. Death, broken bones, a trail of blood. But as soon as Annie and Natalia were across the lawn, Elv darted out.

      “Come on,” she urged Meg.

      “We’re supposed to stay here,” Meg reminded her.

      “It’s Claire. She’s hurt.”

      “They said not to.” Meg’s face was set. She had already decided. She was not going to listen to Elv anymore.

      “Okay. Fine.” Elv was disgusted. Those who could not be brave were condemned to the human world. “Stay.”

      Elv ran across the lawn. Her dress looked as though it had been made of blue jay feathers. Of course she would have the loveliest of them all. Meg had an odd feeling in her stomach as she watched her sister approach the horse. It was resentment, a pit she had swallowed that was already sending out tendrils, twisting through a tangle of her innermost self.

      In the green bower of the park, Elv knelt down beside the horse. Snippets of grass clung to its black hide. There was blood seeping into the lawn, staining the hem of her dress. The blue fabric turned red, then black. Elv didn’t care. She leaned close to whisper into the horse’s ear. She had always believed that dead things could understand you if you spoke their language. Arnish was close enough to the lexicon of death. It was spoken underground, after all, by those who had known the cruelty of the human world. Surely, the horse would be able to hear her. Another girl might have shrunk from the bitter odor of blood and shit and straw, but not Elv. She wished the horse well on his journey to the other side. People in the park stopped to stare. They had never seen a more beautiful girl. Several passersby took photographs. Others got down on their knees right there in the grass as if they’d seen an angel. Looking out the back window of the squad car, Meg wasn’t surprised by what she saw. Of course Elv’s dress would be covered with blood and people would pity her, when she wasn’t even the one who’d been hurt.

      

      CLAIRE REFUSED TO speak to her mother. She wouldn’t even look at her beloved ama. She closed her eyes so tightly she saw sunspots beneath the lids. If she let go, if she failed in any way, the horse’s spirit might wander, miserable, panicked and in pain. It would all be her fault. Everything seemed to be her fault. She might have held on forever, but then she heard Elv’s voice.

      “Nom brava gig.” My brave sister.

      Claire felt comforted by the sound of Arnish. It made her think of birdsong and of their bedroom at home, things that were safe and comforting and lasting. Elv was never afraid of anything. She wouldn’t compromise; she was stubborn and beautiful. There was no one Claire admired more.

      The men from the ambulance continued to beg Claire to drop the reins.

      “Go back to the car,” Annie told Elv. Today the whole world had been turned upside down.

      “Har lest levee,” Elv said to her sister. You can let go.

      Claire opened her eyes. It was a relief to finally drop the reins. Her mother unwound them and then the emergency technicians hurried to lift her and carry her to the ambulance. Claire realized there was excruciating pain in both her arms. The pain was terrible and growing worse. It felt hot, as though lit matches had been placed inside her bones. She didn’t want her mother in the ambulance with her, she wanted Elv. She called for her sister, but the EMTs said no one under eighteen could accompany her. Claire started screaming, and when she did all the birds flew out of the trees, all the moths rose up from the grass in a curtain of white.

      Elv’s shoes were streaked with blood and grass stains. “I’m the one she wants,” she told her mother. “I don’t care what you say. I’m going.”

      Elv got into the ambulance while Annie begged the EMTs to make an exception this one time. Elv was already perched on the bench beside Claire. Meg and the girls’ grandmother had come to wave, but you couldn’t see a thing through the ambulance doors. Elv leaned in close.

      “Se brina lorna,” she whispered.

      Claire couldn’t make sense out of anything that was happening. She was dizzy and confused. Her mother was there now too, telling her she would be just fine. The siren they’d switched on was so loud it was impossible to hear anything more. But she’d understood what her sister said.

       We rescued him.

       Gone