Black Iris Read online

  “Fuck you,” I said impulsively.

  “Now apologize twice.”

  “I’ll run out of here screaming you touched me.”

  “Go ahead, hon. We’re on camera. I’ll have you expelled faster than you can say ‘false allegations.’ ”

  I sank into the chair.

  “Here’s my take.” A steak-sized palm thumped onto the backrest. “You’re a junkie. You throw a few tantrums, get a doc to call you manic-depressive or whatever. He writes you a free pass to the grown-up candy store. Then it’s party time.”

  “No.”

  “I see a dozen girls like you every day. You just want to get wasted. Look up some symptoms, call yourself some flavor-of-the-month disorder, and bingo. Pillville.”

  “You’re wrong.” I took a choppy breath. God, do not cry. “All I do is stay home and sleep.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know. Aren’t you supposed to help me figure that out?”

  He came around and leaned on the desk. He seemed more sympathetic now that I was sniveling. “Why’d you do that to your hair? Cut it off like that.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You were prettier with it long.”

  My throat burned. More fuckable, Jeff?

  “Are you having an identity crisis?”

  Jesus. Everyone with an age that ends in -teen is having an identity crisis.

  “Look, I don’t know much about this homo stuff. There’s a group for it, the Rainbow Alliance—”

  “Oh my god,” I blurted. “I’m not—I’m not.”

  “You can talk to one of your own—”

  “I’m not.”

  “Okay, hon. Whatever you say.” He flexed his burly arms in a shrug. “Chin up, Delilah. It gets better.”

  Wow.

  I almost burst out laughing. Hid it behind a nose wipe. God. This was pretty on par with the ridiculousness of my life thus far.

  You know, though. Delilah was a cunning bitch. She seduced Samson, then cut off his hair for silver. The Philistines gouged his eyes out and enslaved him. So much for strength.

  High school had taught me many things, few of them from books. One was this:

  Strength is not in the body, it’s in the mind. It doesn’t lie in flexing your muscles and crushing those who oppose you. It lies in being the last one standing. By any means. At any cost.

  ———

  Third-floor bathroom. Three cigarettes. My nerves were hopeless. I kept touching Kelsey’s card in my pocket to reassure myself it was real.

  Maybe it wasn’t that crazy. Maybe one day you opened your locker and out fluttered a thinly veiled confession from someone you’d never known looked at you that way and your heart tripped and you face-planted straight into love. Maybe people could fall in love without an identity crisis, without snickers and sly-dog looks in the hall. Just the right words at the right moment.

  Maybe I would go crazy if I didn’t find out why she sent the damn rose.

  Hall 2 looked like a hospital, that long winter light giving everything a cold, disinfected glaze. My hands were pale and flimsy as paper. I wished I’d saved my morning Xanax.

  I timed it so I walked up during the period change, just as Kelsey slammed her locker closed. But she pivoted fast and caught me with a hand in my bag, my mouth agape.

  “Jeez,” she gasped. “You scared me.”

  “Sorry.” I couldn’t move.

  Kelsey laughed, eyes flicking to one side, flirty. “No, it’s okay. Hey again.”

  “Hi.”

  My heart was machine-gunning inside my chest, ribs snapping, bone chips flying. We looked at each other. She was flushed as if drunk. It gave me courage.

  “I got your card,” I said.

  Then the rose was out. Her fingers wrapped around the box and froze. We were both touching but not quite holding it, balancing it fragilely in midair. Kids flooded around us, all reckless voices and sneaker squeaks crashing against the softness of this moment.

  “I just, I wanted—” Inhale, rush it out. “I can’t stop thinking about you, either. I’m crazy about you. I have been for ages.”

  Her mouth fell. Kids glanced at us. Hot eyes, hissing whispers.

  “I can’t—” Kelsey started, then swallowed. “I can’t take this.”

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make a big—”

  She pushed the box at me. “I’m sorry. You’re really nice, Delaney, but I’m not . . . like that.”

  If I have a fatal flaw—besides holding a grudge—it’s the need to understand why. Why do things work this way. Why does this happen but not that. What’s the underlying mechanism, the gears that turn and click into place.

  So I said, “But you got the poem.”

  Kelsey blinked.

  “And I saw you this morning. You weren’t—I mean, you didn’t—”

  You didn’t freak out that I’m in love with you.

  “Oh,” she said quietly. “I thought it was from Luke.”

  Because I’d signed it L. Because she only knew me as Delaney. The name on my ID.

  Because I was no one to her. It was all in my head.

  Across the hall, hyena cackles.

  In the YouTube video, which I watched over and over again later, you see me turning in horror-movie slo-mo. No fear or shock on my face. Pavlov trained me well. There’s only a slack fatalism. My expression doesn’t change as I meet Zoeller’s eyes. My expression didn’t change later when I watched the views tick up on “DYKE GET’S SHOT DOWN ON VALENTINES!!!!,” though my eyelid twitched at the misplaced apostrophe. The rest was a movie, melodrama happening to an actress, all fake. I couldn’t look at Kelsey’s face. I’d humiliated her. Made my sick obsession common knowledge, made her turn me down in front of everyone.

  After I took the rose back, Luke North turned his phone to get the entourage’s reaction, their yipping laughter, ugly, throats vein-gnarled, acne blazing. I watched the video over and over until all feeling went away. Until I stopped imagining popping their heads off as if they were Ken dolls. Until my brain stopped churning raw snuff, blood splatters, faces exploding, beating pounding smashing them into nothing. Cutting them up and cramming the pieces back into those long lupine jaws. Choke on it. Choke on it, you fucking dogs.

  I watched until I was clean. Dead. Pure.

  Zoeller never laughed. He didn’t even smile. He stared across the hall at me, calm and unmoved, waiting. Waiting.

  ———

  Somewhere between pill three and pill four, the nausea kicked in. You’ve got to keep them down, keep that milky venom in your belly until it seeps into the blood, uncoils in a million white silk tendrils and turns to liquid sleep. I dropped off in degrees, my room and the shadows and the song on repeat growing more dreamlike until I wasn’t sure it wasn’t a dream. How sad, to fall asleep and dream yourself exactly where you were. Sleep was supposed to be my away from here. My body had the heavy, meaty feeling it got in REM, limbs thick and sluggish, a weight pressing on my chest that became a creature when my eyes closed. An incubus with Zoeller’s face. It vanished as soon as I opened my eyes. Chill, I told myself. Drift. I listened to “Don’t Dream It’s Over” and wondered how many kids in the eighties killed themselves to this song. Then there was a figure in the doorway and I tried to scream. The figure came toward me, put its hands on me, smothering.

  Donnie.

  “I’m okay,” I said in a strange deep voice.

  He picked up bottles from the nightstand, grimacing. His phone appeared in his hand. Reality was skipping a little, frames dropping here and there like a stuttering video.

  “Whatareyoudoing?” I said, the syllables a smear.

  “Calling 911.”

  I had enough coordination to knock his phone to the floor. “Don’t. I’m okay.”

  The
re was water on his face. No, he was crying. Fuck.

  “How many did you take?”

  If I could just get the wad of wool out of my mouth, I could talk. Except I think the wool was my tongue.

  “I’m calling Mom.”

  “No.” I sat up but my skull was a snow globe, whirling white. Back to the pillow. “I’m okay.”

  “Your pupils are so small.”

  I closed my eyes. The lids were feverish, glowing. I felt like I could see in X-ray through the universe.

  “Don’t go to sleep. Laney, please, don’t go to sleep.”

  Donnie crying made me want to cry. “I’ll be okay,” I said slowly, not slurring. “Two hundred milligrams.”

  “That’s way too much.” He touched my face. His hands scorched. “You’re so cold.”

  “Can you just stay here,” I said, “till I come down?”

  Our fingers laced together.

  In “Fever 103°” Plath talks about illness as divinity and right now I was sick and I was divine. I am too pure for you or anyone, I thought. Your body hurts me as the world hurts God. Later there would be vomit and shredded muscles but for now there was just pure light and no pain. No body. If my heart stopped it would not be the worst thing. As long as they got Donnie out of here, didn’t let him see me destruct like this. But I needed him, too. The only one who really cared, who let me do this shit to myself without letting me die. My Holden Caulfield, catching me when I got too close to the cliff’s edge.

  I dozed in and out, queasy but beautifully empty. In my dreams I stood in a field of falling snow. Flakes collected on my skin, not melting, growing thick and fleecy. When I brushed a finger over my forearm the snow sloughed away and there was nothing beneath but bone.

  It was late when I realized I’d been staring at the ceiling for a long time, lucid.

  The house had that curled-up feeling, tender and stunned after a day of our abuse. Donnie was asleep on the floor beside the bed. I padded to the landing, my mouth dry, my stomach folding in on itself. My whole body felt like origami, paper-thin and bent a hundred ways. Downstairs was pitch-black save for the bluish bleed of starlight from the kitchen. My parents were talking so quietly I didn’t hear them at first.

  “Nothing else works.” Dad’s whisper, flinty, tired.

  “Absolutely not.” Mom never bothered whispering. Her voice was naturally soft, but in a way that made you listen more intently, strain to hear far-off thunder. “It makes no sense. You want to give her pills to make her stop taking pills. That’s insanity. They should medicate you.”

  Shit. They were talking about me.

  “Caitlin, refusing to get her the help she needs is tantamount to child abuse. We can’t do that to her.”

  “How dare you fucking accuse me of abusing my child.”

  My heart lurched, hearing her swear at Dad.

  “I didn’t mean it that way. I meant—you’re twisting this around.”

  “What other way is there to mean it?”

  “Honey, your history is tainting the way you see it. She’s not the same as you. It won’t affect her the same way. And she’s a child.”

  “My child,” Mom said again. No mistaking the possessiveness.

  Something flickered in my heart. Something dark.

  “I made a concession for the Xanax,” she went on. “It’s no worse than a few glasses of wine. But I’m not putting her on mood stabilizers. End of discussion.”

  “You can’t make a unilateral decision on this. Not when you’re . . .” Dad trailed off.

  “Say it. Say it.”

  “When you’re acting unstable, okay? I’m worried about both of you.”

  Mom laughed. Noises: liquid sloshing, glass clinking. Then a silence that she broke.

  “Acting. That’s what I do for you, isn’t it? I act.”

  “I think you’ve had enough to drink.”

  “Oh, this is rich. She could be lying in a puddle of her own vomit and you’re scolding me about the wine.” Something clattered, glass on steel. I felt it ring in my teeth. “I can’t be angry anymore, or I’m having an ‘episode.’ I can’t be sad or everyone hides the sharp utensils and shoelaces. I can’t be fucking human. I have to act ‘normal’ or you’ll have me committed.”

  “You know I’d never do that, Caitie.”

  “What is ‘normal,’ anyway? Is being Mary fucking Poppins normal? Because that’s insanity, to me. Anyone who’s happy in a world this fucked-up has serious psychological issues.” Something clattered again and shattered. She’d hurled a glass into the sink. “You hypocrite. You think I’m crazy because I see things as they are. You’d rather put on Disneyland goggles and watch TV and pretend it’s fine. It’s not crazy if I see monsters when I live in a fucking nightmare.”

  When she spoke to Dad like this I felt sorry for him, but I also thought, She understands. It could be me saying those words.

  “This isn’t the time for philosophical debate,” Dad said. “It’s late. It’s been a long day. We can talk tomorrow.”

  “I’ve never felt more awake. Don’t you see what they’re doing? They want her to be an android. Purge all the faulty human parts, make her a happy little robot. I’d rather she suffered. Suffering is the only honest response to this life.”

  “This is paranoid and disordered thinking, honey.”

  “You have a fucking clinical term for everything, don’t you?”

  Another silence, but in the quiet I heard the pad of footsteps, back and forth, back and forth, neurotically.

  “Caitlin,” Dad said. “Go to bed.”

  “I’m not tired.”

  “You didn’t sleep last night.”

  “How would you know?” Her voice was bitter. “When was the last time we shared a bed?”

  “Honey, look in the mirror. Look at your face. You’ve barely slept all week.”

  “I’m not having a fucking episode, Ben. I’m just stressed.” A rubbery screech. Then: “She’s awake.”

  Rabbit fear shot through me. I turned but nausea welled and I clutched the railing, tamping my guts down.

  Footsteps. That familiar silhouette.

  If I stayed still enough, made myself small enough—

  “I hear you breathing,” she said hoarsely.

  I could never hide in my mother’s house. When I was little, it was a game. Stalk Mommy. At first my hiding spots were childish: behind a curtain, feet poking out, or beneath a blanket that pulsed with hummingbird breaths. But I got older, and better. I’d slink to the landing and peer through the slats with feline eyes, watch her sprawl on the chaise with a book in a gold disc of sunlight. Her back to me, the pages turning and turning until she’d say, startlingly, Hello, Delaney. I’d slink downstairs and circle her, analyze the room like a crime scene investigator. Was it my reflection in a vase? Hidden camera? Did I smell? Finally I relented and asked how she knew. I always know where you are, she’d say. Nothing more. Like it was the truth.

  “Your father and I,” Mom said now, “are discussing whether to medicate you. After your self-medicated overdose.”

  You should talk about self-medicating, I thought.

  “I didn’t overdose.”

  “Do you remember Donovan scrubbing bile out of the carpet? Do you remember me washing it off you in the bathtub?”

  I had no idea what she was talking about.

  “You could have choked on your own vomit. Died like that.”

  “Well, I didn’t.” I stared down at her, glad I couldn’t see her face. “Did you call 911?”

  “No.”

  “Are you going to tell Dr. Patel?”

  Mom considered. “No.”

  Thank fucking God. If I got caught in a suicide attempt, it was mandatory hospitalization.

  “Okay, well, I’m tired, Mom. We can talk tomorrow. I’m go
ing to bed.”

  Her hand darted through the railing, snake-quick, seizing my ankle. Her nails bit the skin. “You go when I tell you to go.”

  I kicked her off and took a step, but I was dizzy and stumbled backward and she was there, catching me. Pinning me to her body. Pointless wrestling for a minute, then I slackened in her arms. Mom was nearly a whole foot taller. It made me feel like a little girl who could never grow up.

  “Let go of me,” I said.

  “Who do you think you are? You’re mine. You’re mine, Delaney.”

  “Let go, you psycho drunk.”

  “I am not drunk.”

  “Then just psycho.” She had me in a headlock. “Mom, you’re choking me.”

  Dad’s voice floated up. “Caitlin, let her go.”

  “I will never let her go,” she said, eerily flat.

  The hall light switched on and Donnie blinked at us and everyone started talking over each other, Mom’s vinegary wine breath on my face. “I will not watch my daughter kill herself in my fucking house,” she said, and I snapped back, “Then I’ll do it somewhere else,” and she said, “Go, then, if that’s what you want. Get the fuck out.” Dad and Donnie pleaded in the background, Honey she’s a child honey stop and Mom please don’t do this, but she was hauling me down the stairs in clothes I didn’t remember putting on, a T-shirt and jeans, no bra or socks. The front door opened, icy wind screaming into the foyer. Mom pushed me out. The concrete stung my bare feet, so cold it burned. I turned around timidly.

  “Mom?” I said in a small voice.

  The door slammed.

  I stood there, too shocked to shiver. Muffled shouts from inside. Outside, the quiet closed in, a thick glass case. On display: fucked-up, pathetic, confused little girl.

  I sank to the stoop, lost.

  Sometime later the door opened. Dad pressed a bundle into my lap: shoes, blanket, phone, keys. “Sit in the car for a while, sweetheart. She’ll calm down.”

  “She’s crazy, Dad. Actually crazy.”

  He didn’t reply, but the look in his eyes said I know.

  I let myself into the garage and climbed into his truck, shaky with cold. Fuck her car. God, what was even happening? Maybe this was all an oxy dream. I’d wake with my head propped on the toilet bowl, staring down at my spewed-up rag-doll stuffing.