Second Sight
by Catherine Rain
It was so long ago that I rarely recall it nowadays, but I remembered it at the last minute. I don't think it changed my decision, but I did find it fitting somehow.
I was only ten years old, and I did not see my baby sister as yet any more than a nuisance. She would cry about things that made no sense to want, and she never wanted what she had. The adults said that all babies do these things, so I merely thought that babies were nuisances. I did not like having a little sister.
One very ordinary day, she was wailing about wanting a cardboard box, up on the entryway table, which she could not get herself. She could walk, but in no way could she climb. I remember thinking how stupid it was for her to want a box, which wasn't for her and probably had some grown-up things in it. Father used to leave boxes on the entryway table all the time, but they were full of odd little widgets, or else full of dense boring books. I could have guessed it was uninteresting, and that Odessa was just making a big fuss out of wanting it because she didn't have it. So I refused to get it for her just to be contrary.
Eventually, though, she flew into a full-blown tantrum, and I knew that if Mother got wind of this she'd think I wasn't taking care of my sister properly. So I gave in and got down the box for her to open, thinking she'd lose interest right away. But I was wrong. The box contained a beautiful porcelain doll, with real hair and delicate clothing. It was the prettiest toy I'd ever seen.
And that was when it happened-- a complete shift in sight. Suddenly I saw myself as if I were her, looking up at the box and thinking it might hold something wonderful and strange. I didn't know about the widgets and the grown-up books, because I was just a baby. But I knew that good things came in boxes, and that sometimes boxes were for me, and I just had to look to find out. I saw what Odessa must have seen. I know it sounds like such a minor thing, but I had never seen it before. Suddenly it made sense why she would demand something so pointless: to her, the demand had a point.
I think she became a person to me that day. And afterward, I wanted to help her. I promised her, though I think she was too little to understand, that I would get her whatever she needed. Oh, it was a bad promise to make, but I was a child and I didn't yet know the consequences when another person sees things differently. I only knew that she could think and feel things that I might not be able to see.
I no longer considered my promise binding as an adult. How could I, once I better understood? But when I ordered the final strike, I did remember...
Author's Note: This was written for K'Arthur, who asked me to write something about Mathiu and Odessa as kids.