Two or Three Things I Forgot to Tell You by Joyce Carol Oates

without a backward glance. Merissa could hear how excited his voice was, how eager and urgent. For whoever was calling Morgan Carmichael, in his home—whoever had intruded on his evening with his wife and daughter—was so crucial to him, nothing else mattered.
    Merissa didn’t follow her father—of course. Merissa didn’t seek out her mother. Instead, like a sleepwalker, Merissa made her way to the stairs.
    Then she ran stumbling up to her room.
    Calmly thinking, There is nothing more I can do. Nothing more Mom can do.
    Merissa shut the door to her room. She was moving blindly, instinctively.
    In the bathroom, her trembling fingers opened the drawer beside the sink, seeking the little paring knife. Yes—there it was.
    Part hidden, at the back of the drawer.
    The blade had been stained several times with her blood. Each time, Merissa had carefully washed it with very hot water and dried it.
    Like a surgical instrument, it was. And still very sharp.
    Nothing more. Nothing we can do.
    Except.
    At the foot of the stairs Merissa’s mother was calling to her plaintively. Probably Daddy would be leaving now—whoever had called him had summoned him away. And Merissa’s mother would come upstairs to her in another minute, she supposed. Wanting to embrace her daughter and cry with her—but Merissa wasn’t going to cry.
    Calmly she closed the drawer.
    Calmly she prepared herself.
    For when her father had departed to his mysterious new life and her mother was in bed, sleeping her heavy, stuporous, medicated sleep—this would be soon, and Merissa could wait.

16.
    â€œNOT GOING ANYWHERE”
    This time, she would not be a coward.
    Taking up the little knife. But her hand shook so, she had to steady it with her left hand. A pulse began to beat hard in her throat.
    Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.
    The touch of the cold steel against her feverish skin. A touch that did not feel razor-sharp so much as consoling.
    Never again to sleep, not a natural sleep. Pulses beating in her head, which would have to be silenced.
    Terrible thoughts like furious hornets.
    Excuse me, honey—important call.
    Excuse me, honey—important call.
    Hearing again the cell phone in her father’s pocket ringing. Hearing again her father’s apologetic words.
    Excuse me, honey—important call.
    Seeing the look on his face. His eyes.
    Seeing how quickly he walked away.
    And her mother calling to her— Merissa! Merissa!
    But that was finished. Hours ago.
    Now the house was darkened upstairs and down and it was a relief to her, the father had gone from her life; and the mother had medicated herself with wine and barbiturates and would sleep while the daughter’s life bled away in silence.
    Not a coward! They would see.
    But her hand shook so, pressing the knife blade against her throat. The carotid artery, beneath her jaw—she knew what this was. Not even Blade Runner had dared to cut in such a place, but Merissa Carmichael would cut in such a place if only her hand didn’t tremble so badly.
    Instead she pressed the knife blade against the inside of her left forearm, where another blue artery beat beneath the soft, pale skin. On the internet she’d learned that the most effective way to slash one’s wrists is not perpendicular to the wrist but parallel to the wrist and the forearm; and so she pressed the knife blade a little harder, badly trembling now but biting her lower lip, determined not to fail— Knew you’d come through! That’s my girl.
    There came a sudden stream of blood, though the knife blade had scarcely penetrated Merissa’s skin—quickly she blotted the wound with a wad of tissues, before any of the blood could drip onto the floor.
    She should lie in the bathtub, she knew. In warm bathwater.
    This would be soothing, she would not be so frightened. She would not be so tremulous .
    But the prospect of removing her clothes, making herself naked and exposed to