“There were once two sisters who were not afraid of the dark because the dark was full of the other’s voice across the room, because even when the night was thick and starless they walked home together from the river seeing who could last the longest without turning on her flashlight, not afraid because sometimes in the pitch of night they’d lie on their backs in the middle of the path and look up until the stars came back and when they did, they’d reach their arms up to touch them and did.” -Jandy Nelson, The Sky is Everywhere

Our growing up was different, at least in comparison to other kids’ families around us. I wonder if you figured that out as early as I did, though I worked hard to protect you from the knowing.

I worked hard to protect you.

From lying about each ridiculous thing you did, like carving lines like a damn tally sheet into the window sill with the scissors (right over the fresh paint, right to our parents face) to keep you out of trouble, to not (ever once) hitting you back no matter how much fist tightening it took. To lying next to you, eyes open, listening for your breathing to deepen so I could fall asleep, to gritting my teeth as you swung me in circles by my forearm, head banging against your bedroom door threshold. Each thud into the wood knocked forgiveness right out of me. Each look at your deer brown eyes sent it straight back in.

You were my baby. 

Our growing up was quick. We learned right away that adults didn’t know a thing, that we didn’t need them for shit. We weren’t going to follow any rule book, as if we ever knew there was one. And we didn’t give a damn what anyone had to say about that. Not one. You can’t throw two little girls like us into a storm and not expect a full blown tornado, the kind that leaves a string of kitchen table legs and busted headboards littered all over the town like a spilled bowl of hard candy from your grandma’s cupboard. We were natural-born scavengers: we got what we wanted, always got what we wanted. But there was something missing, anyway. And we couldn’t quite sit still long enough to figure out what it was. 

We had absolutely no idea what we were doing. I tried to pretend that I did, tried to grab your hand and pull you along behind me, but it didn’t work out how I planned it. That was made apparent with each dingy basement I brought you into, each shackle around our ankles or our wrists. Each puff of smoke or spilled water bottle, full of something thicker than Deer Park–as if it would be full of that anyway, and not some knock-off, Weis-branded bullshit. But we learned resiliency, for better or for worse. We learned that safety wasn’t a house or a home, but a phone call away and a drive to wherever either one of us were. Always, always, always, at least we had each other. At least, there was that. 

There are lots of depressing details that I’ll spare. Anyway, we were just seeking. Seeking for what, we didn’t know, but it felt like it might just be up the next road or at the orange filter of the next Newport 100 or Marlboro Menthol cigarette. We blew through the lives of anyone we ever met, assuring them they’d never forget us, the Dawson sisters, and who raised those girls, anyway?, teachers would ask. But in the midst of everything, we consistently found kindness from what now feels like angels meant to save us, thrown into our paths. We cultivated an unwavering compassion and desire for justice. We smiled and we sang and we danced and we laughed. We partied, each time like we’d never party again. And we loved, one another and everyone we met, as if we knew that’s what we needed all along. No room was the same after we were in it. I have no hesitations in saying that. 

I’ve often wondered if I’ll ever have that ‘mother’ instinct, the one that came out of you somewhere around 7:30 AM on September 30th–like a streak of lightening hit the hospital, a shifting of tectonic plates underneath us, the world rearranging to make room for her. For Lilly. I’m certain the whole place felt the shake. But I’m sure that no one saw you like I did that day when it hit you that, in your words, it was all up to you. As you actually pushed a child into the world, all blood and tears and sweat, with a look in your eyes that I had never seen before and am certain I’ll never see again. A look like a bull coming into an arena, or maybe like a proud tiger, suspended in the air, mid-pounce. Maybe, a warrior who’d fought their whole life for that moment. I can’t ever find the words. Eyes that locked with mine but did not see me, not me and not anything else in the room. It was you and it was her. Already, it was you and it was her. Only a few more breathes. I kept reminding you of that, but you didn’t need it. 

And I understood more than I could say what you really meant when you told me days later: “I knew I just had to do it. It was all up to me.” I understood what you meant because I felt that beside you in closets, I’m sure more scared than you ever were, as I whispered to you: we’re okay, we’re okay, we’re okay. 

I understood that as I watched you stumble and fall, into beds that weren’t big enough, cars that weren’t safe enough, arms that couldn’t hold you. I understood each time I let you down, muddled the footprints I tried to leave behind me. Each time I solidified coping skills that we’d already learned years before, but that I swore I’d guard you against. l understood that each time you shut me out, hung up the phone, hid, determined to do it on your own. And I understood that as I sat huddled in my own closets, without you, praying to a God you didn’t believe in that your eyes would straighten out again, that your speech would quit sounding like slow-dripping honey, that your cough would soften and quit, like mine did. Many, many nights, I wished to be next to you again, tapping you softly with my toes: once for goodnight, three times for I love you. But you were worlds away, and I was powerless. 

Our worlds today are worlds apart, still. You have a beautiful home in a safe, cozy neighborhood, where you hold your baby girl each night, listening for her breathing to deepen so you can fall asleep. Two cars sit in the driveway, and there are toys throw across the living room floor, an entire ball pit in the kitchen. You’re starting school again, with not much of an idea of the why except that you know that you can do it. You have this daughter, this daughter who looks just like you–all big-eyed and seemingly innocent, with a laugh so demanding and jarring and soothing all at once that it could have only come from you. But your girl, she is so knowing, so knowing that she is loved. That she’ll never really need a thing because she has you. 

In that, her and I share a deep, unshakable truth. 

And Livvy, you did that. You never needed me at all. I think, maybe, I knew that all along. You are all strength, all grit, all jaw-dropping truth. No bullshit type beauty. No bullshit type loving. With a conviction for family that inspires and challenges me, pulls me closer to my heart over and over again. Reminds me what’s important. Reminds me what home feels like.

One day I’ll write a book all about you and I, but until then, this is what I’ve got. It almost hurts to write; it’s almost too much. You taught me—probably too early on for me to truly grasp it—a love so profound, so smothering, that it never had enough room. I couldn’t hold it then, and I can barely hold it now. This whole planet, this whole sky, but no space large enough for you and I. And there will never be enough ways to show you how you, in your very own sly and special way, have walked me out of the dark, again and again, taught me—when I thought I was teaching you—to reach my arms up and keep touching the stars. That there would always be something to hold onto. Always be home; always be you.

Thank you, Livvy—my little sister. You never needed me, but I needed you.

You have led me home, again and again. And you have changed me, you continue to change me, forever. 

I love you endlessly. Happy birthday. You’ll always be my baby.

♥