Read Online My Sister's Keeper by Bill Benners - Free Book Online Page A

so she never called. The more she talked, the more interested I became.
    As she moved about explaining how she wanted things arranged, she was charismatic, energetic, and dynamic—her voice gentle one moment and flamboyant the next. She was just as self-confident and enchanting now as she’d been at the age of thirteen and there was no way I could turn her down.
    After I told her I’d do it, I received a gracious thank you and a warm hug, and was on the way out when my eye caught sight of a face in a photograph on the wall. Stepping back, I took a second look. It was a ballet pose. Sixteen girls in the same black and silver costume. And right there in the front row was a girl that looked exactly like Ashleigh. Her hair was up in a tight bun and though she was much younger and less developed, I was certain it was Ashleigh.
    Sydney’s voice startled me as she stepped up behind me. “Are you critiquing another photographer’s work?”
    I pointed to the photograph. “Isn’t that the Matthews girl? The one that’s missing?”
    “ Ash? Missing?”
    “ It looks like her. The police think she might have been murdered.”
    Sydney gasped. “Ash? I haven’t heard anything about that. What happened? When?”
    “ Monday morning her landlord found her house open and a lot of blood inside, but they haven’t found her body.”
    Sydney’s hands covered her mouth and her voice fell to a whisper. “The studio is closed this week. This is the first I’ve heard.”
    “ She lived next door to me, but I hardly knew her.” I touched the photo with my finger. “That’s Ashleigh, isn’t it?”
    “ Oh, yes. That’s her. A good dancer, too. I thought she’d go all the way to Broadway.”
    Broadway? I’d walked it often, but on the wrong side of the street. I’d carried a camera when I should have carried a script and a playbill. I thought just getting to New York would take me close enough to the action to open doors to what I really wanted—Broadway theatre. But, it’s a big place and there were so many doors. I exhaled. “Maybe she’ll turn up alive.”
    “ I hope so. She’s a beautiful dancer.”
    She gave me another hug and we said goodbye.
    Seeing Sydney had definitely revved up my spirits. My emotions were flipping around wildly, diving and climbing like a kite with a short tail on a windy beach. I wanted to do the photography for her, but was going to have to keep things on a professional level if I didn’t want to end up crushed when it was over.
    I stopped by Barnes & Noble and picked up a copy of Peterson’s Field Guide to Eastern Birds , then spent the afternoon shooting a new line of audio mixing boards for Barleystone Corporation’s catalogue and web site. As I worked, my mind retrieved many lost memories of Sydney that made me smile. Although I’d paid no attention to it at the time, I now realized just how much of a crush she’d had on me back then and wondered how she’d taken it when Jewell and I stopped dating.
    I had one more session scheduled that afternoon—a portrait of an older couple—and the moment they stepped into the camera room, I realized there was something very different about these two.
    Mr. and Mrs. Jacob Ballance appeared to be in their eighties. They were frail and weathered. Yet, there was something fresh and alive within them. They touched each other as if they were pieces of heirloom crystal and their voices were soft and sympathetic. Their eyes caressed one another with the tenderness of a first-time mother with her newborn child. It was dazzling.
    During the session I asked Mrs. Ballance if she remembered the first time she’d laid eyes on her husband and as she spoke about it, her cheeks flushed and her eyes twinkled. It was mesmerizing. I took a picture and the flash froze their images for a brief instant. The joy in her eyes and the love in his hung suspended for a second and I knew the photographs would be remarkable.
    I burned a lot of film on Mr. and Mrs. Ballance