The Sister Surprise by Abigail Mann (read full novel TXT) 📗

‘She sounds like her mother when it comes to break-ups.’

‘Katsu curry is for Rory what Malbec is to Ginger.’

‘Your generation. Honestly.’

Mum and Ginger became friends at playgroup when Rory and I were babies, and we’ve been solid fixtures in each other’s lives ever since. Whereas Mum is stubbornly independent, the same isn’t true for Ginger, who has welcomed countless boyfriends and five fiancés into their house over the years. Rory and I started to make bets on how long they’d last, with a sherbet Dip Dab awarded to the closest guess within a week.

‘I’m surprised Rory hasn’t moved back in with Ginger whilst she’s in between flats. All that money she could save,’ says Mum, wistfully.

‘She wants to be independent. I don’t blame her, to be honest. Ginger keeps telling her to forgive Myles, but why should she when he has a propensity for Thursday evening cocaine and can’t say where he spent the last three nights? Anyway, I don’t think that Rory finds living with Ginger particularly … calming.’

Mum scrapes her hair into a top knot, rubs her neck, and looks at me from beneath a puff of fringe.

‘What about that one you went out with? Dan? Demi?’

‘Drew.’

‘The American. Any more dates on the cards?’

‘Pfff, absolutely not. He told me he hates cats because “they have no concept of the alpha male”, which is really … disturbing.’

I slide Pickles off my lap. He lands on the floor with a sizeable thud owing to his near spherical shape, achieved by eating three dinners a night thanks to neighbours who fall victim to his feigned cry of starvation.

I pull out a plastic wallet containing the script I wrote for tomorrow’s live stream, my lines neatly highlighted in pastel green. As I re-read it, a band of tension tightens across my forehead. The lines I wrote to sound authentically casual now read like I’m trying too hard, which, of course, I am. Mum puts her hand on the back of my chair and cranes forward. She smells like hemp hand cream and sandalwood smoke.

‘Want to practise with me?’

‘No,’ I answer, folding the page in half. She holds her hands up, as though absolving herself from a crime.

‘Sorry for asking! What’s it about anyway, this TV thing you’re doing tomorrow?’

I pull one leg up, hug my knee, and peek through my overgrown fringe. ‘It’s not on TV, it’s the internet.’ I breathe in slowly. It feels like a moth is fluttering in the core of my chest, tickling up my throat until it’s between my teeth, ready to be spat out.

‘Yes, well, near enough.’ Mum rubs her eyes. ‘Go on then, tell me.’

‘We’re going to have our DNA profiles revealed,’ I say, my heartbeat pulsing in my neck. Mum dangles a tea towel in front of her. Pickles lazily bats it with his paw. The kettle flicks off, but she doesn’t move to pour it. ‘Max and I posted samples to a lab. Well, so did everyone, but we were chosen to lead the feature.’

‘What does it tell you, this test?’

‘Err, well, something to do with our nationality based on shared genes.’

‘Oh!’ Mum flicks the tea towel onto a worktop and picks up the kettle. ‘Fashion changes all the time. I expect the feature won’t age well with the rate that trends move on these days.’ She puts a mug down on the table and screeches. ‘Ah! That bloody animal! Shoo! Go on, off!’ She swats a hand in front of Pickles, who howls and shakes his paw, having stepped on a sticky leaf that he’s now wearing like a ski.

‘No, not like that. It’s DNA stuff. The science-y bits that make up a person. We find out … we find out—’ I stutter, tiptoeing around the edge of a conversational landmine. ‘We find out where our DNA is traced to, so there’s a chance that my paternal data is—’

A rapping noise turns our attention to the back door, where Ginger is just visible through the window. I can tell she’s on tiptoes; the strain is visible in her eyes, wide, wet, and husky blue.

A throaty squeak breaks through chugging sobs that accompany her entrance. Ginger shrugs herself out of a faux fur cape and lets it drop to the floor before collapsing into a kitchen chair with renewed trumpet-like sobs.

‘Ginger! Whatever is the matter? Oh, Ginger! Let me get some wine. Ava, a bottle of white. Ava?’

I open the fridge and slide a bottle off the top shelf as Ginger tries to talk through guttural tears. ‘I’ll get out of your way,’ I add, not quite loud enough to be heard above the cooing and sobbing coming from the table. Going by the state of her, I can safely assume that I’ve won the sherbet Dip Dab this time, but I’ve missed my last chance to ask Mum about my father before tomorrow.

I leave them to it and plod upstairs, take off what little remains of my make-up, and practise my ‘camera face’ in the mirror whilst I sweep rosewater serum over my neck. An article I’d read on Refinery29 said that three litres of water a day and botanical toners would get rid of the dark circles under my eyes, but even after buying every product listed and teaching myself Japanese facial techniques, I haven’t seen a change.

‘No way, that’s unreal! Like, so cool …’ I whisper to my own reflection, trying to make my delivery sound detached and aloof like the fresh-from-the-womb media graduates that Duncan insists on hiring. ‘No, I’ve never wondered about him,’ I say, unconvinced by my own smile. ‘Not for a minute.’

Chapter 2

‘Are … are you sure this is what Duncan asked for?’

‘Yep,’ replies the stylist with a curt nod. I blink beneath false eyelashes so thick I feel like I’m about to take off. My hair has been scraped back into what I have been reliably told are called ‘space buns’, giving my eyebrows an arched quality thanks to eye-watering tension