The Weird Sisters Read Online Free PDF

supernatural strangeness into something depressingly critical and pedestrian, as in, “ ‘ Don’t you think Rose’s outfit looks weird ?’ Bean asked,” that Shakespeare didn’t really mean the sisters were weird at all.
    The word he originally used was much closer to “wyrd,” and that has an entirely different meaning. “Wyrd” means fate. And we might argue that we are not fated to do anything, that we have chosen everything in our lives, that there is no such thing as destiny. And we would be lying.
    Rose always first, Bean never first, Cordy always last. And if we don’t accept it, don’t see, like Shakespeare’s Weird Sisters did, that we cannot fight our family and cannot fight our fates, well, whose failing is that but our own? Our destiny is in the way we were born, in the way we were raised, in the sum of the three of us.
    The history of this trinity is fractious—a constantly shifting dividing line, never equal, never equitable. Two against one, or three opposed, but never all together. Upon Cordy’s birth, Rose took Bean into her, two against one. And when Bean rebelled, refused any longer to play Rose’s games, Rose and Cordy found each other, and Cordy became the willing follower. Two against one.
    Until Rose went away and we were three apart.
    And then Bean and Cordy found each other sneaking out of their respective windows onto the broad-limbed oak trees one hot summer night, and we were two against one again.
    And now here we are, measuring our distance an arm’s length away, staying far apart and cold. For what? To hold the others at bay? To protect ourselves?
    We see stories in magazines or newspapers sometimes, or read novels, about the deep and loving relationships between sisters. Sisters are supposed to be tight and connected, sharing family history and lore, laughing over misadventures. But we are not that way. We never have been, really, because even our partnering was more for spite than for love. Who are these sisters who act like this, who treat each other as their best friends? We have never met them. We know plenty of sisters who get along well, certainly, but wherefore the myth?
    We don’t think Cordy minds, really, because she tends to take things as they come. Rose minds, certainly, because she likes things to align with her mental image. And Bean? Well, it comes and goes with Bean, as does everything with her. To forge such an unnatural friendship would just require so much effort.
    Our estrangement is not drama-laden—we have not betrayed one another’s trust, we have not stolen lovers or fought over money or property or any of the things that irreparably break families apart. The answer, for us, is much simpler.
    See, we love one another. We just don’t happen to like one another very much.

TWO

    S ummers are always the same in Barnwell—thick, listlessly humid days, darkened occasionally with rolling thunderstorms that keep lushness in the lawns and fields. We remember the heat like an uninvited guest. When we were small, it was not so bad; we ran through the sprinkler, bribed our parents into trips to the college’s outdoor pool, let our hair stick to our foreheads as we cooled ourselves with homemade Popsicles. But as we grew older, it became our enemy. We sat in our bedrooms, the largest fan we could find placed inches away, beating the still air into an angry frenzy that did nothing at all to reduce the heat. Sleeping was impossible, and we would often be found wandering the house, our white nightgowns gleaming in the darkness, a trio of Lady Macbeths, driven mad by the mercury.
    After we had all moved out, our parents had central air-conditioning installed, too late to save the doors from warping, or halt the omnipresent mildew that plagued books that alit anywhere for longer than a few weeks, but making living here in August at least bearable. In the winter, we were still subject to clanking, hissing radiators, liberal use of space heaters, and, in one