Maple doesn’t have a sister. Actually, I take it back. Maple once had a sister, who filled her imagination so wonderfully. When Maple was six years old, her mother, one day, looked at her in the eyes and excitedly said in a voice she could still hear in her head, “You are going to have a baby sister.” Maple was quiet and often subdued. She nodded and walked away. Yet, deep down inside her heart, she was leaping and dancing with great joy. “A sister! Finally, a sister!” Maple only has brothers, and having a sister was a dream come true.
Months went by. Somehow the baby bump never showed. Maple’s mom looked the same. And the topic about her sister never came up again, and she was too afraid to ask.
So Maple moved on with her life as the only girl in the family. One day she visited a church, and someone told her that the women in the church were all sisters. It was an overwhelming idea. “What does it mean? How does it work?” Maple thought incredulously. Yet, it felt good knowing there could be sisters outside of her family.
But Maple already had a good friend from school. She was rich, tall, and very pretty. Maple was often mesmerized by her friend’s thick, smooth, and long hair. She wondered why she could never have hair like that. Her short and frizzy hair had suffered many bad perms. Her friend also had the most amazing wardrobe and accessories for a 13-year-old. Maple didn’t envy her. She didn’t know envy; she only felt inadequate and awkward around her fabulous friend.
I once read about a woman that struggled with weight. I will call her Sue. One day, Sue decided to go on a regiment to lose weight. All of her girlfriends were very excited for her. They encouraged her and rooted for her to reach her goal. Little by little, Sue began to drop the pounds. The women rallied behind her and continued to cheer her on. A few months later, Sue lost so much weight that she was looking slim…slimmer than all of her friends! The cheers gradually faded. One by one, these girlfriends walked away as they were envious of the new Sue. Unlike the young Maple, these old girls knew envy.
Some say women are catty. Is that true? I have two daughters that are nearly two years apart. As I watch them grow, I agree they do fight like cats.
“Mom, why do you only save Jie Jie’s drawings and not mine?” My youngest asked, irritably, “I always find my drawings in the recycling bin.”
I was caught off guard, fumbling for words to say.
“I know,” she continued, “I am a bad drawer.” My 7-year-old hung her head.
Ever since the girls were little, the younger one liked to imitate her older sister. Day in and day out, she practiced and practiced, as she tried to draw like her older sister. I rarely paid attention to her work. In my eyes, there was only one artist in the family. As for my younger girl? She’s good at other things. Yet, she still spends most of her free time drawing. I decided I should look more closely at her pictures so I can keep a few. The rest now goes into a “forever” bin where a stack of paper has grown to be almost three feet tall.
Whenever the girls fight, I, the OLDEST GIRL of the family, sometimes say the dumbest things.
“If you can’t stand her, then I will just give her away!”
“NOOOO! You can’t give her away!”
“But you said you don’t want to be around her anymore!”
“Yes, but YOU CANNOT GIVE HER AWAY!” Victoria was getting hysterical.
“What do you want Mom to do, then???!”
This mom, who has no sisters, just doesn’t get it. You don’t need to do anything. There is no need to get involved.
What these girls needed was simply time, time to cool off, time to feel the longing to love, and to be loved again. Sure enough, within an hour, these two girls were giggling and playing again as if nothing had happened. On and off, they would continue to fight like cats, and love like…sisters.
I found this note just last week. It says,
“Dear Victoria, Thank you for being the best sister ever. Still, but you’re mean!”
So what happened to Maple?
It would take thirty years for Maple to ask her mother the question she was too afraid to ask. What happened to…baby sister? It was an uncomfortable and difficult conversation. “Maybe I shouldn’t have done it, right, Maple? That wasn’t the right thing to do, right? We are Christians now, and God wouldn’t like it, right? But I didn’t know better. And money was tight…” Maple’s mother stammered, recalling a painful past.
It was a moment of shock. I don’t know how Maple took it, but I heard she wept.
I am truly grateful that I have enjoyed many, many deep and meaningful friendships at different phases of my life. I have more sisters than I had ever dreamed of.
I know me and my sister never see eye to eye on a lot of things. We even fought like cats and dogs growing up, but I know deep down inside if I was ever in a bind she will be there to help and vise versa…
Dear G, your story and relationship with your sister did play a part in inspiring me to write this piece. You are both so real, and so endearing, even when you disagree with each other.