against the wall. I smashed her vanity mirror with my
elbow.
“I’ve been thinking about you and me,” I called out.
I shoved the closet door shut and went toward my bedroom.
There, I did the same thing, pulling up the sheets and tossing the pillows onto
the floor as if I’d find her hiding underneath.
“I don’t think anything is going to help us. I remember the
little yellow pills that Daddy forced you to take, before he left, but those
didn’t help. And the doctor? That didn’t help either.
“I thought maybe I could escape it. That I wouldn’t get sick
like you. Of course, I was an idiot. I’ve been sick ever since Daddy left. I
mean, don’t you remember the spider?”
I grabbed a vase in the hallway. It was one of my mother’s
favorites with its flower-eyed ceramic print, a wedding gift from my
schizophrenic grandma. I threw it against the wall.
“They’re going to have to lock us away and shove needles
full of sedatives under our eyes and, sometimes, people are just cursed. Did
you hear me? Can you hear me? Sometimes they’re just cursed and nothing in the
world can save them.”
I went back into her bedroom with lighter fluid I stashed
under my bed, and threw it across the carpet. I doused her bed sheets and her
clothes. I splashed it across the walls and her vanity , leaving ugly wet marks everywhere .
The pungent smell burned my throat. I pulled a lighter from
my pocket.
“Can you hear me, Momma?” I said softly. “Can’t you see you
made me in your fucking image?”
Downstairs, a window broke.
“Momma!” I cried out, and I dropped the lighter.
I ran into the kitchen. Glass glittered on the tiles.
Someone had broken the window and the curtains blew into the twilight beyond. I
edged toward the window.
The only source of light in the neighborhood emanated from
the open front door of Phaedra’s house. It was a red door, a loud door, fitting
for the mother and daughter across the way that wanted so badly to be sick. It
was the only red door on the row. The only open door. The hinges creaked slowly back and forth.
Something had opened that door, had grabbed it, wrenched it
open, and thrown it back until it slammed against the foundation. Something in a great hurry.
Here’s another story for you:
The mad girl with the missing mother climbed through the
broken window toward the red door. The wound in her stomach ripped open again
with stress. When she crossed her friend’s lawn, she smelled the woods spilling
out of the open door, the smell of loam, dirt, and lightning-struck trees.
Maybe in a past life the girl had once been a great hunter.
She’d once woven for herself a crown of ash and deer bone and conquered all who
would defy her with her great hunting bow.
No longer.
Now she was a ruined girl, a girl crushed by a night sky
bloated with factory smoke. She was a dirty girl who rarely bathed, and smoked
too much for her own good. If she found a great hunting bow these days, she’d
probably try to sell it at a pawnshop.
The mad girl wasn’t prepared for what lay beyond the red
door. She knew she was in the middle of a terrible, otherworldly conspiracy she
could never hope to understand. The hunter could’ve conjured up the beasts of
the forest to go into the house and destroy whatever waited for her there. The
mad girl probably couldn’t even bend down to tie her shoelaces without falling
over, would lie in the grass screaming at her own shadow writhing beside her.
The mad girl was a stupid girl. Even without those powers,
she went through the red door anyway.
She found grass, weeds, and flowers growing on the floor.
Ivy hung from the walls as if it had been growing there for years. It’d started
wrapping itself in lazy, suffocating circles around the couch and the coffee
table, plunging itself into the piano. The mad girl picked through the
overgrown weeds, nearly tripping over a dining room chair. She called out for
her mother. She called for Phaedra.
The mad girl
elbow.
“I’ve been thinking about you and me,” I called out.
I shoved the closet door shut and went toward my bedroom.
There, I did the same thing, pulling up the sheets and tossing the pillows onto
the floor as if I’d find her hiding underneath.
“I don’t think anything is going to help us. I remember the
little yellow pills that Daddy forced you to take, before he left, but those
didn’t help. And the doctor? That didn’t help either.
“I thought maybe I could escape it. That I wouldn’t get sick
like you. Of course, I was an idiot. I’ve been sick ever since Daddy left. I
mean, don’t you remember the spider?”
I grabbed a vase in the hallway. It was one of my mother’s
favorites with its flower-eyed ceramic print, a wedding gift from my
schizophrenic grandma. I threw it against the wall.
“They’re going to have to lock us away and shove needles
full of sedatives under our eyes and, sometimes, people are just cursed. Did
you hear me? Can you hear me? Sometimes they’re just cursed and nothing in the
world can save them.”
I went back into her bedroom with lighter fluid I stashed
under my bed, and threw it across the carpet. I doused her bed sheets and her
clothes. I splashed it across the walls and her vanity , leaving ugly wet marks everywhere .
The pungent smell burned my throat. I pulled a lighter from
my pocket.
“Can you hear me, Momma?” I said softly. “Can’t you see you
made me in your fucking image?”
Downstairs, a window broke.
“Momma!” I cried out, and I dropped the lighter.
I ran into the kitchen. Glass glittered on the tiles.
Someone had broken the window and the curtains blew into the twilight beyond. I
edged toward the window.
The only source of light in the neighborhood emanated from
the open front door of Phaedra’s house. It was a red door, a loud door, fitting
for the mother and daughter across the way that wanted so badly to be sick. It
was the only red door on the row. The only open door. The hinges creaked slowly back and forth.
Something had opened that door, had grabbed it, wrenched it
open, and thrown it back until it slammed against the foundation. Something in a great hurry.
Here’s another story for you:
The mad girl with the missing mother climbed through the
broken window toward the red door. The wound in her stomach ripped open again
with stress. When she crossed her friend’s lawn, she smelled the woods spilling
out of the open door, the smell of loam, dirt, and lightning-struck trees.
Maybe in a past life the girl had once been a great hunter.
She’d once woven for herself a crown of ash and deer bone and conquered all who
would defy her with her great hunting bow.
No longer.
Now she was a ruined girl, a girl crushed by a night sky
bloated with factory smoke. She was a dirty girl who rarely bathed, and smoked
too much for her own good. If she found a great hunting bow these days, she’d
probably try to sell it at a pawnshop.
The mad girl wasn’t prepared for what lay beyond the red
door. She knew she was in the middle of a terrible, otherworldly conspiracy she
could never hope to understand. The hunter could’ve conjured up the beasts of
the forest to go into the house and destroy whatever waited for her there. The
mad girl probably couldn’t even bend down to tie her shoelaces without falling
over, would lie in the grass screaming at her own shadow writhing beside her.
The mad girl was a stupid girl. Even without those powers,
she went through the red door anyway.
She found grass, weeds, and flowers growing on the floor.
Ivy hung from the walls as if it had been growing there for years. It’d started
wrapping itself in lazy, suffocating circles around the couch and the coffee
table, plunging itself into the piano. The mad girl picked through the
overgrown weeds, nearly tripping over a dining room chair. She called out for
her mother. She called for Phaedra.
The mad girl
Similar Books
