Rosie's Ballad

I've been away a long time. I left my family home at 19 with my girlfriend, Hannah, for what was supposed to be a month of holiday that we hadn't really planned, because I needed to get away from my parents for a while in a hurry. What ended up happening was the two of us stayed out there for 2 and a half years, during which time I didn't contact my family at all. I was going to do it early on, I really was, but I didn't see why I should do so soon, I'd only been gone a month. I also didn't want to risk having to speak to either of my parents, or clueing in my sisters to the fact that something was wrong between us by one or all three of us refusing to interact. I wanted to let my sisters at least know that I would be gone for a bit longer than anticipated, but then suddenly I'd been on my month holiday and as far as they knew I'd been missing for a further 6 weeks. By that time I didn't know what to do: I could just leave it and see if I ever decided to go home again and deal with it then maybe; or I could call them and try to reconcile for the lost month and a half over the phone or over text, and then do that every 6 weeks until I went home. I never consciously made a decision, really, but passively I forced myself into the first option. The longer I left it, the worse I thought it would be for everyone if I contacted them. 'Sorry I haven't spoken to you in 9 months, just letting you know I'm alive and I miss you and I won't be explaining myself. I hope you aren't mad, but if you are there's nothing either of us can do or say that'll change anything'. Imagine how well that would've gone.

Eventually we decided we should go home. Mostly because our work permits had run out, but partly because Hannah missed her mother. See, Hannah had done her part and had kept in touch with her family, and her mother and my older sister were in some form of contact, which is the only reason I can see for why there was no international missing persons inquiry even though I hadn't spoken to anyone who might worry about me for 2 and a half years.

So, we skip forward to my arrival home.

Hannah's cousin Georgia, who was driving both of us back from the airport, dropped me off at the front door of my childhood home. The place I'd grown up with my two sisters, whom I loved dearly, and my two parents, whom I was less thrilled about in general these days.

I didn't really want to go inside and have to deal with my problems. I didn't want to see my parents at all, in truth. I didn't even want to knock on the door.

But I did.

And who answered but Danielle, my older sister. Her voice rang out before she opened the door, before I could see her, she sounded so happy. I hadn't announced I was coming back, though I'm sure she must've caught wind of Hannah's plan through her mum.

"Coming, one second!"

I heard the familiar clunk of the key pin, it was strangely comforting to know they hadn't changed the locks at least. The door opened inwards, almost unveiling Dani to the world outside, even though 'the world' in that moment was just me.

She'd changed, but only a little bit; she was already an adult when I'd left. Her hair was shorter, cut to just below her shoulders, and it was wavy, that was new. I guessed she'd just stopped straightening it recently, but I didn't even know for definite that she straightened her hair before. Her skin was slightly darker, and it looked good; she had a sort of happy glow to her, and I was pleased to see that she was doing well. Her warm smile felt so familiar and so bright.

I watched her expression change as she realised who it was that had knocked; she looked shocked now, not sad or horrified-shocked but definitely surprised. She tried to hide it the moment she realised her face had fallen.

"Tommy?" I'd missed hearing my name, if I'm honest, at least I had when it was said like that. The only English person I'd spoken to in my whole time away was Hannah, and it wasn't the same when she said it.

Before I could respond to her she stepped out of the door and brought me into a hug, she put her arms around my chest just beneath my shoulders. She hugged me tightly for a long time. I didn't say anything, I didn't think it would be right for me to speak first just in case she thought I was trying to cut her short. I hugged her back. God, I'd missed her.

"I've missed you so much, Tommy. Why didn't you call?"

"I don't know," I said, after a slightly uncomfortable hesitation. That wasn't strictly a lie, but it felt like one.

"Come in," she sniffed, and as she pulled away I saw that her eyes were wet. "Mum and dad are still out, we weren't expecting you. You really should've rung ahead,"

"I know, sorry about that."

"Well it's still early, you're lucky I haven't got tea on or you wouldn't be eating," she smiled for a second, and I gave her an amused exhale.

She turned and walked back inside, with me following. I shut the door behind me.

"Don't bother locking it, I meant to unlock it this morning but I've been so tired today and I forgot,". The house was oddly quiet when she stopped talking. In truth I'd expected noise, I'm still not sure how to feel about silence most of the time.

"Liv's got a friend over still I think, you should say hi once she leaves,"

"I will, I've missed Livvy,"

"Think she misses you too. She's been dead lonely without you,"

Liv's been lonely without me? We were always pretty close, but I hadn't expected her to wait for me to get back. Still, she had a friend over so maybe Dan was exaggerating to make me feel wanted here since everyone else seemed to be occupied.

I followed Dani into the lounge, I watched her as she moved. She seemed almost nervous, hesitant. Similar to how you act when someone walks into your bedroom and you're scared they'll notice something you didn't have time to hide. She turned to look at me.

"Well. Make yourself at home, your room is still free, obviously. Liv's been sleeping in there, she says your bed's more comfortable, but she doesn't bring her friends in there,"

Liv has been sleeping in my room?

"How long's she been doing that?"

"She stayed in there for like three weeks the night you left, then she went back in her room until Julie said that you and Hannah had gotten jobs and she's been in there most nights since,"

"Hm."

That was where that conversation ended, I decided. It was no use asking Dani because she probably didn't know the ins and outs of Liv's decision here, and it's not like it was that weird anyway. I let it go, and I thought no more about it for the moment.

Some time later, after I'd been in my room for a while, I heard Liv and her friend leave her room and walk downstairs to the front door. It was still pretty early, so I thought they were going out together. I exited my room and went downstairs to the living room, where I was surprised to find Liv sprawled out on the armchair, her eyes weren't closed but she wasn't looking at anything.

I didn't say anything to her at first, sitting down quietly on the long sofa furthest away from her. I sat quietly for a small while, my eyelids getting heavy and my exhaustion from travelling getting the better of me.

"Hey."

I opened one eye to see Liv standing in front of me a few steps away, but I shut it again slowly, not taking any time to look at her face.

"Hey," I replied, absently. I was pretty tired.

"That was fucking rude."

"What?"

"Where've you been? I thought you were dead." Her voice sounded bitter, almost angry.

I heard Dani's voice coming from the doorway, "Liv, c'mon. Don't be like that,"

"Are you-? Whatever." Her footsteps were loud as she walked towards Dani, trying to leave the room.

"Sit down with us, please? Watch a film, or something? I'm gonna cook soon, stay down here. Please?" Dani pleaded with our little sister, who silently agreed after hesitating for a second or two. Or, I assume she agreed because she did end up sitting down with us. I wasn't aware of Dani's plan to watch a film, I'm not even sure it was a plan at all really; I think she just wanted the three of us to be in the same room again the first chance she got.

Dani picked up the TV remote off the coffee table, and I opened my eyes when she flopped down next to me on the sofa. She didn't ask for suggestions, she just pressed the Netflix button, chose her profile, and started scrolling through films. I said nothing, because I had precious little opinion on what we were going to watch, and Liv said nothing either, she just stared at the screen.

Dani settled on Spirited Away. Absolute classic, very good choice. It was all of our favourite film when we were small, and no matter how much we watched it it never got old. Still doesn't, it holds up. No one said anything still. Part way through I noticed that Dani was sleeping peacefully, and when I looked over I noticed that Liv had her phone in her hand but was staring at the TV instead.

Dani woke up at about 5 o'clock, near the end of the film, and put her hand on my leg to get my attention. "I'm gonna go start tea, I'll be back," she said to me quietly.

"Alright, you need a hand?"

"Nope, I'll yell if I do,"

As soon as Liv was sure Dani was far enough away to not hear her on the stairs she stood up and left. She still hadn't said anything since before the film had started. I let her go, I wasn't even sure what I'd say to her if I was going to.

I watched until the end and turned off the TV, I went upstairs as quietly as I could go and knocked on Liv's door.

"Yeah?"

I opened the door.

"Hey,"

"Hey."

"I'm back,"

"I can see."

There was a pause. She obviously didn't want to talk, but I did, so I had to figure out how to keep it going.

"Are you mad at me?"

"Nope."

'Liar', I thought. "You sure?"

"I'm fine."

"You aren't,". Her eyes were wet, sort of glassy, if I didn't know better I might've guessed she'd just yawned. I could still see the hurt, though; through the tears not yet formed I could see that she was in pain, and I reckoned my guess why was probably right.

"It's nothing."

"I'm not stupid," I said, as I sat down on her bed

She paused at that, briefly. She looked over at me and I saw the sadness drain from her eyes, replaced with a wet anger.

"I'm fucking livid. Are you happy? I'm absolutely furious because my idiot big brother picked some bimbo over his sister."

Just the one sister?

"Don't talk about her like that, Livvy,"

"Shut the fuck up. You missed my birthday. Twice. You didn't send a card, or call, or even text me." Tears started to form properly in her eyes as she spoke, her voice choking slightly in her throat, "You've blanked us all for two fucking years and you've come back and you just want to be friends again?"

I had done that, sort of. I can absolutely see why coming back suddenly like this might have given her that impression. Still, though, her view wasn't as clear as she thought.

"There's a lot you don't know about that, Liv. If you think I chose Hannah over you two, and that I left to be with her instead because I'm stupid and I hate you, then why would I have bothered coming back while we're still together?" I paused to let her soak that in, but not long enough to let her think I was done talking, "Because we are still together, you know; I like Hannah a lot, but not enough to just drop you and Dan like tha-"

"Then why?!" she interrupted. Her voice got caught getting that out; tears were beginning to run down her face, leaving streaks on her red flushed cheeks that reflected the light, "Why did you leave for so long? Why else would you have done that?"

"That's private, Liv." I wasn't lying, I really didn't want to tell her. Neither did our parents, clearly. If they had told her then she would've understood, she may have even followed me, but she didn't, so they hadn't.

"Bullshit. Get out of my room." Her voice sounded angry again.

"Liv," I said, as I wrapped my arms around her shoulders and pulled her into my chest, hugging her tightly.

"Go be a bitch somewhere else," she choked on her words again, hard this time. I heard her start to sob. I felt her entire body heave, and I cradled her while she cried into my shirt. Her tears soaked through the fabric and I could feel it getting cold on my chest, I knew her eyeliner would stain my shirt, but it didn't bother me much. I scooped her up and shuffled slightly so she was sitting on my lap; she wasn't fighting, certainly not as much as she would've been if she'd really wanted me to leave.

I held her there for a while. Her tears stopped flowing long before I let go, and when I finally nearly did I noticed she had balled a small part of my shirt up in her fist, keeping her close to me even as I felt my grip on her loosen slightly. She didn't flinch; if I'd felt myself letting her go slightly then I thought she should have. Her eyes remained closed, or at least the one I could see did, her face had relaxed and her breaths had calmed. Instead of heaving to catch her breath she was gently, slowly, rhythmically breathing. Just breathing.

She was asleep. I brushed some of her hair off her face, some of it was stuck to her cheek where her tears had dried when they hadn't fallen onto my shirt. I stroked her hair absentmindedly. She looked peaceful, cute even. My cute baby sister, sleeping in my arms.

When I looked at her now I noticed how she'd changed while I'd been away. She was pretty now, very pretty. Her pale, round cheeks weren't flushed so red anymore, but they were still rosy. Her eyebrows were clearly preened but still looked mostly natural; her eyelashes were long and dark, lightening slightly at the ends; her lips were full and pouty, though that might've been emphasised by her face being squished against me like it was; her nose and cheeks were dusted with pale freckles, and while that wasn't a change I certainly did notice it. I suppose she'd always looked sort of like that, I just hadn't noticed because she'd always been my sister and it wasn't part of her that I'd paid much attention to when I was younger. She looked more mature now, though, and I couldn't help but acknowledge that when I looked at her.

I stayed where I was for a while longer, not wanting to wake her up. I could tell she'd needed that cry, but it was probably exhausting and I could also tell she'd need this sleep now too, so I let her have it.

That plan, however, was interrupted not too much further in by my older sister yelling for us both to come down for dinner. I didn't want Liv to wake up, in truth. I wanted to stay like that for a bit longer. She was warm, and I knew it would be jarring and uncomfortable to have her get up now, but her eyes flickered open and she gave a weak, nondescript groan at me.

"Dani's calling for tea," I said, slightly muted as I hadn't said anything in a while.

"Come on then," her voice was groggy, and I couldn't help but smile. Thankfully her eyes were closed again as she freed herself from my arms and stood up. I followed her lead, my body feeling disappointingly cold and empty again.

Throughout the meal Liv was quiet, but didn't seem hostile or on edge at least. Dani tried sparingly to make some conversation with her, but Liv either ignored her or gave a one syllable answer or a grunt that didn't really leave any room for a conversation to continue. After the fourth attempt, she let Liv go and switched her attention to me.

"So, welcome back, Tommy. I know I said it already but it's good to have you here again, you know? We missed you,"

"Why do you think I'm back? I missed you guys too. It's really nice to see you both again,"

"Mum and dad aren't eating with us, I'm sure you've noticed. Sorry about that,"

"Eh, not to worry. They weren't the ones I came back to see," I laughed a little to myself at the end, trying to make it sound like it was a joke. I meant it, though.

Dani laughed slightly too. Good.

"So how's Hannah?" Liv remained silent, but I could see her expression change from the corner of my eye, from sleepy contentedness to soured but mostly neutral.

"She's good, she's staying with her cousin in town while we get our bearings back. She applied for a few jobs before we even got here, I think she's desperate to have our own place again." I saw Liv's expression change again, this time to slightly upset. I thought my mind was playing tricks on me, the change was so subtle that I didn't think I should have been able to notice even if something had changed at all.

"How busy of her!" Dani joked to herself, but it was true. "What about you?"

"I haven't gotten that far yet, I was working up until the day before we left and it's been a long journey, you know? I'm exhausted, I think I'm gonna take some time to recharge"

"Long way back from Australia, isn't it?"

"God, getting back was so much harder than getting there,"

"You had a whole life to move back with, you didn't even take anything with you when you left!"

"In fairness, we didn't plan to stay as long as we did,"

"Glad you're back now, though. You plan to stay long?"

"Well Hannah's getting a job here again, so I think we're gonna stay for at least a bit, yeah. I just hope she asks me this time," I laughed a bit again, mostly just to indicate that it was a joke and not a genuine criticism of my girlfriend. Dani must've found it much more amusing than I'd expected because she laughed harder than I expected.

"She's quite the live wire, isn't she?"

"She does move fast,"

The end of that part of the conversation was clear to both of us, but I wanted to fill the silence.

"How's Dec?"

Piss-poor move from me.

She broke eye contact with me visibly, her voice was quiet, "We broke up not long after you left, actually." Her voice sounded sad, mostly, but I thought I could hear a bit of anger too. "We'll talk about that another time, yeah? Now's just-"

"Not the time. Sorry, yeah." I paused, "That's something I should've known."

"It's fine," It wasn't fine, she didn't even sound convinced of that herself.

Suddenly we heard crying from the next room. Not adult-crying, though, and for a minute I couldn't place it. Dani excused herself quickly, leaving me alone with my younger sister again who was newly more alert, having heard the same sound. The crying silenced just as suddenly as it had started, but before I could think of anything to say to her to try to start a conversation Dani reappeared in the doorway.

Holding a baby.

"Is that..?" I began, not really knowing how I should phrase it to not sound like an idiot or an asshole.

"This is Rosie, she's been asleep all day, but..." Dani gently bounced her in her arms.

"And she's..?"

"She's mine, yeah,"

"My god..." I didn't really know what to say. I had been such a dreadful brother, I'd missed her whole pregnancy and I hadn't even known she'd been pregnant. Why the fuck did I do that? Should I have anticipated her to have a kid? No. Should I have fucking checked in with them, even a little bit? Absolutely. I didn't deserve the kindness she'd shown me since I'd gotten back, a realisation that had only just fully hit me.

"She's three months old," still she was being kind. It was almost as if she didn't blame me, almost as if she didn't mind that I'd missed one of the biggest events possible in her life because I'd been selfish. She had every right to be as angry as Liv was, angrier one could argue, but she wasn't. She didn't know what had happened to push me away either, but she seemed to have forgiven me anyway.

My words were caught in my throat this time, I choked up and my eyes started to water.

"Will you hold her?"

Will I? That was the most saddening way to phrase that. Not 'Would you like to hold her?', not 'Come hold her,'. She wanted me to hold her baby, but she was worried that I would say no. That hit me so hard, somewhere deeply painful. In her eyes, even though she loved me enough to offer her child's safety to me out of love for both of us, she saw me as a man who might refuse. That hurt, and I nearly understood for a second how I'd made them both feel. I held back my tears.