My Sister's Keeper

"What's your problem?" I asked, and then I went into the bathroom, turned on the shower, and smelled it—sweet and almost angry, the same boozy scent I associated with Jesse's apartment. I started opening up cabinets and rummaging through towels and trying to find the proof, no pun intended, and sure enough there was a half-empty bottle of whiskey hidden behind the boxes of tampons.

"Looky here…" I said, brandishing it and walking back into the bedroom, thinking I had a great little wedge of blackmail to use to my advantage for a while, and then I saw Kate holding the pills.

"What are you doing?"

Kate rolled over. "Leave me alone, A

"Are you crazy?"

"No," Kate said. "I'm just sick of waiting for something that's going to happen anyway. I think I've fucked up everyone's life long enough, don't you?"

"But everyone's worked so hard just to keep you alive. You can't kill yourself."

All of a sudden Kate started to cry. "I know. I can't." It took me a few moments to realize this meant she'd already tried before.

My mother gets up slowly. "It's not true," she says, her voice stretched thin as glass. "A

My eyes fill up. "Why would I make it up?"

She walks closer. "Maybe you misunderstood. Maybe she was just having a bad day, or being dramatic." She smiles in the pained way of people who really want to cry. "Because if she was that upset, she would have told me."

"She couldn't tell you," I reply. "She was too afraid if she killed herself she'd be killing you, too." I ca

The next time it came up was after my mother came into our room to talk about donating a kidney. "Don't do it," Kate said, when they were gone.

I glanced at her. "What are you talking about? Of course I'm going to do it."

We were getting undressed, and I noticed that we had picked the same pajamas—shiny satin ones printed with cherries. As we slid into bed I thought we looked like we did as little kids, when our parents would dress us similarly because they thought it was cute.

"Do you think it would work?" I asked. "A kidney transplant?"

Kate looked at me. "It might." She leaned over, her hand on the light switch. "Don't do it," she repeated, and it wasn't until I heard her a second time that I understood what she was really saying.

My mother is a breath away from me, and in her eyes are all the mistakes she's ever made. My father comes up and puts his arm around her shoulders. "Come sit down," he whispers into her hair.

"Your Honor," Campbell says, getting to his feet. "May I?"

He walks toward me, Judge right beside him. I am just as shaky as he is. I think about that dog an hour ago. How did he know for sure what Campbell really needed, and when?

"A

"Of course."

"But you were willing to take an action that might kill her?"

Something flashes inside me. "It was so she wouldn't have to go through this anymore. I thought it was what she wanted."

He goes silent; and I realize at that moment: he knows.

Inside me, something breaks. "It was… it was what I wanted, too."

We were in the kitchen, washing and drying the dishes. "You hate going to the hospital," Kate said.

"Well, duh." I put the forks and spoons, clean, back into their drawer.

"I know you'd do anything to not have to go there anymore."

I glanced at her. "Sure. Because you'd be healthy."

"Or dead." Kate plunged her hands into the soapy water, careful not to look at me. "Think about it, A

She pulled these examples right out of my head, and I could feel myself blushing, ashamed that they were even up there to be drawn out into the open. If Kate was feeling guilty about being a burden, then I was feeling twice as guilty for knowing she felt that way. For knowing I felt that way.

We didn't talk after that. I dried whatever she handed me, and we both tried to pretend we didn't know the truth: that in addition to the piece of me that's always wanted Kate to live, there's another, horrible piece of me that sometimes wishes I were free.

There, they understand: I am a monster. I started this lawsuit for some reasons I'm proud of and many I'm not. And now Campbell will see why I couldn't be a witness—not because I was scared to talk in front of everyone—but because of all these terrible feelings, some of which are too awful to speak out loud. That I want Kate alive, but also want to be myself, not part of her. That I want the chance to grow up, even if Kate can't. That Kate's death would be the worst thing that's ever happened to me… and also the best.

That sometimes, when I think about all this, I hate myself and just want to crawl back to where I was, to the person they want me to be.

Now the whole courtroom is looking at me, and I'm sure that the witness stand or my skin or maybe both is about to implode. Under this magnifying glass, you can see right down to the rotten core at the heart of me. Maybe if they keep staring at me, I will go up in blue, bitter smoke. Maybe I will disappear without a trace.

"A

"She said she was ready."

He walks up until he is standing right in front of me. "Isn't it possible that's the same reason she asked you to help her?"

I look up slowly, and unwrap this gift Campbell's just handed me. What if Kate wanted to die, so that I could live? What if after all these years of saving Kate, she was only trying to do the same for me? "Did you tell Kate you were going to stop being a donor?"

"Yes," I whisper.

"When?"

"The night before I hired you."

"A

Until now, I hadn't really thought about it, but Campbell has triggered the memory. My sister had gotten very quiet, so quiet that I wondered if she'd fallen asleep. And then she turned to me with all the world in her eyes, and a smile that crumbled like a fault line.

I glance up at Campbell. "She said thanks."

SARA

IT IS JUDGE DESALVO'S IDEA to take a field trip of sorts, so that he can talk to Kate. When we all reach the hospital, she is sitting up in bed, absently staring at the TV set that Jesse flicks through with the remote. She is thin, her skin cast yellow, but she's conscious. "The tin man," Jesse says, "or the scarecrow?"

"Scarecrow would get the stuffing knocked out of him," Kate says. "Chy

Jesse snorts. "The Croc dude. Everyone knows the WWF is fake." He glances at her. "Gandhi or Martin Luther King, Jr.?"

"They wouldn't sign the waiver."

"We're talking Celebrity Boxing on Fox, babe," Jesse says. "What makes you think they bother with a waiver?"

Kate grins. "One of them would sit down in the ring, and the other wouldn't put his mouthguard in." This is the moment I walk inside. "Hey, Mom," she asks, "who'd win on Hypothetical Celebrity Boxing—Marcia or Jan Brady?"

She notices then that I am not alone. As the whole crowd dribbles into the room, her eyes widen, and she pulls the covers up higher. She looks right at A