Free The Truth About Julia: A Chillingly Timely Psychological Novel by Schaffner Anna Page B

are ice-blue just like mine, only bigger and better – like everything else about her. Even her voice is smooth and sweet, while mine has more than once been compared to a scratchy jazz record, and, not very flatteringly, to that of a chain-smoking nightclub singer. Yet, in spite of all this, it was Amanda and not I who became obsessed with her appearance when she crossed the thorny threshold into adulthood, and she found it sorely wanting: her weight, her skin, her hair, her style – she began to dislike everything about herself. Soon, all her energy was consumed internally, used up in the perpetuation of self-flagellating thoughts. I hated seeing her doing that to herself; it pained me and I just couldn’t understand where it was coming from.
    It is such a sad female speciality, self-hatred – I see it everywhere, even here, even among the most intimidating and seemingly confident-looking women: they over- or else under-eat, they cut themselves, they drink, they smoke, they take drugs, they fall for people they can’t have or who treat them like shit, they cover their skins with crude tattoos that, like marks of Cain, loudly announce to all and sundry that they have broken the law, and not one of them uses her time to enhance her prospects for post-prison life. Instead, they turn on each other just to pass the time. Every day, the guards have to intervene in the many scuffles that keep breaking out. But so far, they all leave me be – even the most belligerent ones. I don’t know why. Perhaps word has got round about my crime. Perhaps that knowledge scares them as much as it scares me. I try not to think about it.
    Amanda had always been shy, but in her teens her timidity became so extreme that she would barely speak a word unless she was among family. She didn’t go out much and passed entire days alone in her bedroom, doing nothing; she struggled at school and grew ever more reclusive and lifeless, as though she was wilting on the inside. I realized just how much she had changed one Saturday in August. It was our great-aunt Myrtle’s birthday. As every year, Myrtle held a grand garden party in her Hampstead home. All our relatives and many of my parents’ friends came; attendance was a family obligation. Some cousins and nieces travelled all the way from France and Germany to be there.
    ‘She says she’s not coming,’ my father said in a low voice. My mother wrung her hands. Dressed up and ready to go, they were standing at the bottom of the stairs, looking uneasily at the closed door of my sister’s room on the first floor, as though something bad they couldn’t quite grasp was happening behind it. Although they didn’t speak about it, they had been worrying about Amanda in their quiet way for months. I found their silent sadness unbearable, and decided to go up and shake Amanda out of her stupor.
    ‘Amanda, I’m coming in,’ I called before opening her bedroom door. The air in her room was heavy with sweat and misery – it was a sweltering day, but her windows were closed and the curtains drawn, and my sister was lying fully clothed on her bed.
    ‘God, it’s stuffy in here!’ I said before drawing the curtain and opening her window.
    Amanda moaned and covered her face with her hands, as though the sunlight was hurting her eyes.
    ‘Dad said you’re not coming. We always go – Aunt Myrtle will be heartbroken if she doesn’t get to pinch your cheeks this year. Honestly, Amanda, get your act together. You know that Mum and Dad are too nice to force you, but they’ll be terribly disappointed if you don’t come. And why wouldn’t you? Look, it’s such a lovely day!’
    ‘I can’t,’ Amanda said.
    ‘What do you mean, you can’t? It’s not like you’ve lined up an exciting alternative programme for the day, is it? A bit of sunlight will do you good.’
    ‘I can’t,’ she repeated.
    ‘Why not?’
    ‘Can’t face it.’
    ‘Can’t face what ? It’s our family – it’s not like you’d