Chapter 14.
Miranda lay awake in the small hours next to the placidly sleeping form of her beautiful wife and tried to stop analysing how she felt about her 'new' sister. Several hours after Charlie's whirlwind visit, Miranda still felt like a daisy on a lawn which had been flattened by a heavy roller. Not many people, in fact no-one in the world, had ever done that to her before, and she was completely overwhelmed.
Charlie and she were certainly different, that was for sure! But they were so different in fact that Miranda could see how they might fit together like opposing jig-saw pieces. All her Ins were Charlie's Outs. She realised this, even on their first astonishing meeting.
Where Miranda had deeply introverted tendencies beneath her public persona and found it almost impossible sometimes to express her true feelings, even to her nearest and dearest, Charlie was totally out there, without hesitation or fear of failure. She was astoundingly open.
Where Miranda was intensely self-conscious about her own appearance, building at least an hour into each day to maintain her facade of perfection, it was evident Charlie dressed simply to express herself and amuse others. She hadn't even bothered with any make-up neither. Looking at her shape, she was obviously a carboholic, but she didn't seem to care, and it certainly hadn't harmed her career.
At dinner, Emily had found some You-Tube footage of Charlie-Bee's performance on stage on her phone, to show Miranda and Andy. The woman had filled the Albert Hall, for goodness' sake! She was a legend in the UK, and there were some fleeting images of her partner as well, an exquisitely good-looking slim Asian princess, who flashed dark eyes almost equalling the brilliance and size of Andy's.
But it was Charlie's massive affection and physical outreach to a woman she had hardly heard about a few days before, which touched Miranda on a level so deep it quite unnerved her. She had almost been swallowed up by sisterly love, and the need the woman had to touch and hold, to feel and kiss her.
This was a love quite different from the way Andrea worshipped and also commanded her. Her wife could turn her simultaneously into both a quivering deity and a slave to her own libido. Their mutual passion was sexual, unique and devotional. But this was different. This was family love, from a sister.
Miranda had never had a sister. Her knowledge of 'sisterly affection' came mainly from the books of Jane Austen. The nearest equivalent had been love from Andy's mother, Jenny, whom Miranda genuinely adored, but this was something else again. Charlie was young still, maybe twelve or thirteen years younger than her, and completely upfront and fearless.
She felt again the impact of that 'death by squashing' first embrace, the physicality of it, and the fact that Charlie obviously had no knowledge whatsoever of her reputation in New York as an untouchable, the frostiest of snow-queens. And in the dark, the little girl who had once been Miranda, enduring eight years from age three to eleven without a single kiss, or any hugs, only beatings, being kicked out onto the back yard or being thrown down the cellar steps to spend hours alone in the darkness, came back into her and she felt tears of happiness roll down her cheeks as she relived that astonishing hug, her sister's kisses and the way she had pulled her into her chest.
Miranda squinted at the clock. 1am, and they had a flight back to New York to face twelve hours later. She needed to sleep. But as she rolled over and put her arm gently round Andy's waist, to nestle in behind her, she decided Charlie coming into her life would be a good thing, yes, a very, very good thing. And if there was more hugging and sloppy kissing, then she wouldn't mind at all. And with that thought, Miranda fell asleep at once, and didn't wake for another seven hours.
When they arrived home in Manhattan much later the same day, and did the jumping back five hours thing, the whole family, even Pumpkin and Tilly, all seemed ecstatic to see them. Miranda was tired, definitely, as she found it very hard to sleep on flights, but she was also buoyed up by the loving endorsement of the Princheks she'd met so far, and the absolute proof which had come through in the DNA tests, that she was indeed who she had thought she was, their lost half-sister, and the child of Joseph Princhek, 1922-2009.
When Cara had gone home, and Amelia was finally settled down to sleep clutching her beloved Big Bunny, and small mouse, Miranda sat down on the sofa between her twins and told them all about the real reason for her visit to London.
"You sneaky thing," said Caroline, nestling into the crook of her arm and putting her head against her mother. "So it wasn't just for work? You've found us yet more relations? Honestly, we'll have to start writing Christmas cards in October at this rate!"
"Are they nice?" asked Cassidy, more to the point as usual. "Will we like them? Are there any cousins our age?"
"I'm sure there are. The brothers have thirty children between them. But I'm only just getting my head around them all. Andy and I are returning after Independence Day with Amelia as well for another visit, and I'll know more then."
"And they all belong to your father's side of the family. But how did you find out? You have never even mentioned him before."
"I know. I knew so little about him, only his name, and the fact that he dumped my mother. But he wrote a book and told the whole story. You can read it yourselves, if you like. I wouldn't stop you."
"Maybe later," yawned Caroline. "I'm up to my ears with learning the music camp repertoire right now. We're doing some seriously difficult stuff, Sibelius's 5th for example, which has masses of exposed cello in it."
"And I'm prepping for space camp," said Cassie. "Show us later, when we get home, Mommy, and we'll be all for it. I just want to be sure you're happy, Mom, that these new relations won't upset you."
Miranda was touched by how caring her children had become, how sensitive to her feelings, rather than obsessed with their own, in recent years. She knew how much this was down to Andrea's mentoring and guidance, and yet again thanked the universe for sending that bright angel into their lives.
"No, sweeties, they won't upset me. I'm very happy with how the trip went, and we'll certainly all know more after our next visit."
"Andy will look after you," said Cassie, giving a gusty sigh. "That's a great comfort to me, that you're under her management."
And Miranda laughed and laughed. The teenager didn't lie. More and more these days, Miranda did indeed feel under Andy's management, and it gave her a warm feeling of loving and positive security.
Andy, meanwhile, was talking to Sheldon on the phone up in her office.
"It was just a business trip," she lied when Sheldon wanted to know where she'd been. "Miranda needed me with her, that was all. But we are home now and I have the rest of this week free if you'd like to meet up."
"Honey, of course I'd like to meet. But let's do it outside your family home, so we're not interrupted with screaming children. How about the Metropolitan Museum first floor café?"
"My children don't scream," retorted Andy, conveniently forgetting the decibels Amelia could produce on occasion, "But that's fine if you prefer. How about coffee, tomorrow at eleven?"
"Great. And I'll bring you up to speed with how the interview article has gone. I'll email it over before we meet."
"Thanks. See you tomorrow!"
Andy was happy to turn back to matters pertaining to her own career. She had a possible scheme for her next novel sketched out over a number of different documents and settled down for a couple of hours merging them together and doing some concentrated writing.
When Miranda came to urge her into bed, she looked up apologetically as she realised how the time had shot by.
"Sorry, darling. This jet-lag/time difference is playing havoc with my circadian rhythms. I'm not sure if I'm awake or asleep anymore."
"If you're busy writing. I don't want to disturb you," said Miranda, secretly hoping Andy would be sufficiently disturbed to come to play bedroom games with her.
"No worries, I'm happy to be disturbed. Fancy a smooch in the hot tub?"
Miranda thought she'd never heard such a sweet invitation, even though it would be four am by now in London, and her eyelids felt very heavy. This trans-Atlantic lifestyle was certainly strenuous.
But Andrea held out her hand, and Miranda took it. She decided again the truth of what she had said to Charlie in London, that she definitely was the happiest woman in the world, by far.