“Forgive me for being selfish but I never told Cassie or her Grandmother about you at first because I wanted her all to myself." said Maud. "Weren't they ever curious about where you were staying?" I asked. "I just told them that I was staying with a very strict aunt who did not allow me to have visitors. However, when Cassie found her birth certificate in the letter that her Grandmother had hidden for so many years she was adamant that she was going to find her father. She said she had a friend
who worked at the Registrar General's Department who could search the records there and find her father's address so I had to stop her. That's when I told her everything.” said Maud. She went on to say that when she finally broke down and told Cassie everything, how her father was dead and that she lived with me, Cassie was mad. "She reacted just like how you are reacting now, you were truly sisters.” I rolled my eyes at her. Maud said that Cassie said she felt betrayed because she had told Maud everything that ever happened to her, yet Maud kept such a huge secret from her. “So you should know exactly how I feel then!” I said. Maud kept on talking about her and Cassie’s relationship going sour and then she said that she was the one who encouraged Cassie to come to my house with the children. I jumped to my feet! “What!” I exclaimed. I sat back down in disbelief. I put my hands to my forehead, which was throbbing with pain. It was years since I had such a severe headache and my entire head felt like it was about to explode! “I am sorry Miss…I’m sorry Sister CeeCee, but I never expected you to behave the way you did the day they came here. You were always such a nice person to strangers and I thought you would have taken then into your home because you are such a good, kind and compassionate person.” At this point my eyes were widening at Maud's continued nonsensical babbling! Did she really think that I would let complete strangers into my home? I must have missed something else in the fifteen years she was staying here with me. Maud was mad! She must be mad! She was stark raving mad! How else could she think that I would have taken Cassie and the children into my home? She asked me to let her explain some more so I told her to continue. She said they came up with the plan for Cassie and the children to come and stay with me when the TreTre Gang members began to harass Cassie and they feared for her life. The intention was that they would tell me the truth after I had grown to love Cassie and the children. I looked at Maud incredulously. I could not believe what I was hearing! I laughed and it was not even funny! “Really Maud.” I said, bitingly. “Really, I would have grown to love them? I could have been killed and nobody would have known that it was because of your careless actions in bringing strangers into my home that caused my death!” “You played me for an idiot! You know, I am really happy that you got that job because I don’t think I want you around me anymore!” Maud fell on her knees before me crying. “Don’t talk like that Sister CeeCee! Please forgive me Sister CeeCee, I didn’t know that all that took place since Cassie came here would have happened. We never thought that the gang members would find out where she was. I am truly sorry. I wished I could have said something to you but then I would have had to let you know that we were sisters and then you would have gotten angry because I have been here all this time and didn’t tell you.” The more Maud kept talking the angrier I was getting. Conroy was still asleep and I did not want to wake him so I tried my best to compose myself but I was slowly losing my cool. I still could not believe that Maud had been lying to me all this time! When I remembered the night when the soldiers found Radijah, or Rajah as I called him, in the yard, I shuddered. What if a shootout had taken place? What if my dogs had been poisoned instead of the cats? All because Maud had taken it upon herself to disrespect the boundaries that I had in place for not only my home but for my life! I looked down at her as she sat on the floor in front of me, head bowed, weeping. For the first time in my life my compassionate self seemed to have gone in hiding. I felt nothing for Maud. Her tears did not move me. I thought about the fifteen years that I had lost with both of my sisters and the role of Aunty that was denied me. How could I forgive Maud for the role she had played in this scenario? I said as much to her. Still crying she reiterated that the only reason she went along with the plan was because they thought that Cassie and the children would be safe with me. It took them three months to fine-tune everything so that I would not suspect that she knew Cassie. They were never going to reveal that we were sisters until much later. It was when she said ‘he said your home was safe and it was the best place for Cassie and the children’ that my ears perked up. “He who?” I asked. “Which he are you talking about? Who said that this was the best place for Cassie and the children?” Maud jumped up from the floor, realising that she had said something that she was not supposed to have said. She covered her mouth with her hands. “Lord Jesus! Lord Jesus! Whooiiee Lord Jesus! Lord Jesus!” I got up from the chair and held onto her shoulders and shook her a little. “Don’t tell me that the Lord Jesus told you to take Cassie and the children here because the Lord Jesus that I worship does not work like that! He would have said something to me first! Which ‘he’ said that my home was the best place for Cassie and the children?” She began crying even harder and when she saw me raise my hand to shake her again she said, “Reverend Julian, Sister CeeCee, Reverend Julian! Reverend Julian said this was the best place for Cassie and the children!”
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