What Remains Of Us
Chapter One
Nora Wright wasn’t prepared for the call – not that night, not ever. The day had been like any other, yet indescribably different at the same time. The kind of day that felt ordinary, yet scratched at the edges of her nerves like a splinter she couldn’t quite see. Had she noticed the hairs on her arms standing to attention, or the chill down her spine despite the stifling summer heat? Perhaps if she hadn’t been so distracted trying to flirt with the regulars at the bar for tips, she would've noticed her phone vibrating in her back pocket. Then again, maybe none of it would’ve made a difference; maybe everything happened exactly as it was supposed to, and Nora would have to live with the consequences of that.
She had not long returned home from her fifth night shift that week, tired, headachy, limbs aching beyond the repair a single night of sleep on her shitty mattress could offer. The flat was oppressively quiet — not surprising given the hours she worked. Her latest roommate Laura – a mousy girl who had replied almost embarrassingly too fast to Nora’s advert for her spare room – had dozed off on the sofa again, an empty wine glass balanced precariously on the armrest. Nora barely registered her presence, stripping off her shoes and collapsing onto her unmade bed, clothes still clinging to her skin. Her phone lay forgotten in her back pocket, the missed calls going unnoticed.
It was hours later that her phone rang again. This time she heard it – despite being absolutely sure she had left it on silent – still the familiar shrill ringtone pierced through the quiet, waking her with a start. She fumbled for it, squinting against the dim glow of light in the darkness, and brought it to her ear with a muffled hello to the caller on the other end.
“Honour –” The caller’s voice was blunt and serious, their nervousness barely detectable to the untrained ear. It took a moment for the name – her real name, not the nickname she used – to register, feeling both foreign and familiar as it rolled off the speaker’s tongue.
She didn’t respond immediately, silence hanging in the air between them. It had been years since she’d heard her mother’s voice. Some people might have said too long, but those people didn’t know her mother like she did.
“Honour,” her mother tried again. Her name a little more desperate this time.
“Hello Ruth,” she replied, forcing neutrality, her skin prickling hot and icy cold all at once. The sun hadn’t yet pierced through her shabby bedroom curtains indicating that she hadn’t slept nearly enough yet. “To what do I owe the pleasure?” The sarcasm slipped out, as natural to her as breathing. Her fingers unconsciously fought the crease etched into her brow, a permanent mark of her mother’s calls. The line was silent, so quiet that Nora wondered if she was dreaming or if she was the victim of a cruel prank. Either way, her patience grew thinner. “What do you want?” she snapped.
A choked sob broke through the line. Nora’s stomach plummeted, a jolt of fear slicing through her sharp and cold like ice cracking beneath her feet. “Mum?” Her voice sharpened, dropping all pretence. “Mum, what's wrong?”
“It’s…it’s your sister –” The words spilled out in gasps, each one more jagged than the last. Nora shot upright, her body moving before her mind could catch up. She began pacing the cramped space of her room, as though the motion might steady the chaos brewing inside her.
She forced calm into her tone, though her pulse thundered in her ears. “Breathe, okay mum?” she said. “Just tell me what's going on.” Her voice softened, as if coaxing a frightened animal. She knew the many versions of her mother like an old scar, knew how to navigate most of them. But it didn’t stop the rising panic. “Please, Mum. Tell me.”
Her mother inhaled sharply; the kind of breath that comes before everything breaks. When she finally spoke, her voice was so faint that Nora almost didn’t hear it. “It’s Hope. She’s dead.”
The cruel truth about grief is that it doesn’t come with a survivor’s handbook, there’s no universal way to grieve that can be used as a point of reference. No how-to guide for dummies on dealing with the aftermath of the worst news a person can get. Nora had thought she understood grief. She had experienced death a handful of times in her life – though most of those memories were hazy – softened by the blurred edges of childhood. But still, she had convinced herself she knew how to handle loss. Until now.
This grief felt alien to her, like an unwelcome guest she didn’t know how to host. It didn’t crash in all at once, like she’d imagined, but lingered just out of her reach – a strange, hollow ache rather than the tidal wave she’d expected. Nora had no idea how to sit with it, let alone what to do next. She thought she might cry, but the tears didn’t come. Instead, she sat there until the texture of her bedroom carpet imprinted onto her knees, waiting for something – anything – to break through the numbness.
Her gaze fell to the phone on the floor, the screen cracked but still dimly lit, casting the room in an eerie glow. It was then she noticed them – the missed calls. Four of them in total, scattered across the night, all from the same person: Hope.
Her breath caught in her throat, choking her, as her heart hammered in her chest. She buckled to her knees, hands trembling, a deafening ringing in her ears. She reached for the phone, pressing it to her ear again. Her mother’s voice crackled on the line, raw and broken sounding more like static than words. Nora swallowed hard, forcing her voice past the lump in her throat. “Are you sure? What..what happened?” her whisper felt fragile, as if even asking the question might shatter her completely.
There was a long, agonizing pause, filled only by her mother’s shaky breaths. “I don’t know,” her mother said at last, her voice hoarse and trembling. “The police. They found her at home. I think – it must’ve been an accident.” her words faltered, breaking on something unspoken. “Hope wouldn’t – she wouldn’t do that.”
“Wouldn’t do what, Mum?” Nora asked, even though every fibre of her being screamed not to. She didn’t want the answer. Deep down she already knew.
“It was an accident,” her mother repeated, firmer, almost to herself. “They said it was quick. That she didn’t suffer. It had to be an accident. She wouldn’t leave me like this.”
The words settled heavily in Nora’s chest, wrapping tight around her lungs. She wanted to push, to demand answers, to scream that she was lying, but it was futile. Her mother wouldn’t – or couldn’t – say more. Nora wasn’t sure she wanted to hear it anyway.
The silence stretched between them, heavy and suffocating. Nora opened her mouth to speak, to try to comfort her mother somehow, but the words never came. She could only remain silent whilst the guilt gnawed away at her insides. If Hope were here, she’d know exactly what to say, how to console their mother. Hope would’ve answered the call…
When her mother finally spoke again, her voice was sharp and cold, and a civil hostility ensued. “You have to come home.” It wasn’t a request. It never was with her mother. “Someone will need to sort through Hope’s things.” The implication was clear: that someone was Nora. She stared up at the peeling wallpaper and cracked ceiling of her flat, thoughts spiralling. She hadn’t been to her childhood home in years – not since she’d left it behind for good. She wasn’t sure she could do it, walk through those doors without Hope by her side. The thought alone was unbearable. But she knew she couldn’t stay here, couldn’t pretend this was something that could be handled over a phone call. The thought of her mother – all alone in that house – tugged at something repressed deep inside of her. She was the last person Hope had tried to reach, and she hadn’t been there. She owed her sister this much.
“Okay,” she said finally, her voice steady even as her insides quaked. It didn’t matter if she agreed anyway; her mother had made up her mind. “I’ll come home.” Nora ended the call without saying goodbye, letting the phone drop on the bed beside her.
She sat in the darkness, feeling hollowed out, staring blankly at the ceiling. She felt only the shell of herself; like the version of her who knew how to be a sister had died long before Hope, lost in the years of silence between them.
God…Hope – Who had snuck her food when she was sent to bed hungry. Who held her hair back after her first party when she’d drunk too much. Hope had always been her unwavering constant – until she wasn’t. And when Hope had needed her the most, Nora hadn’t been there.
The guilt clawed once again at her insides. On autopilot, she moved to pack a bag: underwear, jeans, an old hoodie, socks, her one good dress. The motions mechanical, detached. She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror and didn’t recognise the person she’d become. Somewhere along the way, the distance between her and her sister had become unbridgeable, and she hadn’t even noticed.
All she knew was that Hope was gone, and maybe she wouldn’t be if Nora had simply answered her phone when she had called. There was no one to blame but herself, and she had never been the forgiving type.
She zipped up her bag, and grabbed her keys, the cold metal biting into the skin of her palm. She welcomed the slight infliction of pain with a small, satisfied smile. After scribbling a hasty note for Laura – more out of habit than necessity – she climbed into her beat-up Ford Focus and began the long gruelling drive back to her mother’s house.
Back to face everything she had spent her entire life running from.