Broken Glass

by V. C. Andrews

  After he left, I sat on the bed and contemplated my fate. What was left to do? I could try to get that door open again. Of course, if I didn’t and he saw chipped wood when he returned, he’d know that I had tried, and that could bring the worst. But being forced to have his baby was the worst anyway. Perhaps it was time to choose between death and what would come day after day now.

  Last year, there had been a suicide in our school. A boy named Hampton Hill had shot himself with his father’s pistol in his father and mother’s bedroom. He had been under a lot of abuse from other boys in his class because he seemed ambivalent about his sexuality. Things had become worse when one boy accused him of making sexual advances. Some parents had apparently complained that their sons were uncomfortable with him in the locker room before and after gym class. We had heard that his own father was belittling him for not being in an after-school sport and for not having friends, especially girlfriends. Haylee had said that was why he used his father’s gun and killed himself in his parents’ bedroom. He’d wanted to get revenge.

  “Some revenge,” I had told her. “He’s dead.”

  She’d laughed. She always laughed at a lot of things I didn’t think had an iota of humor in them.

  I wondered if she was going to laugh now.

  I picked up the bread knife and stared at it for a few moments. I could try to kill him. I had thought about it a few times, but killing someone, even someone like him, seemed more difficult than killing yourself. And what if I failed? He might not kill me; he might torture me for weeks and weeks until I died, just as I had almost done before. No, suicide was a better choice now.

  Where would I want to die?

  I looked about the dismal basement apartment to consider my choices. Do it in the bathroom, maybe over the sink with the water running? Sit at the dinner table with my arm extended? Maybe on his newly laid carpet? No, I thought, it would probably be best to lie down on the bed and close my eyes. I pulled back the blanket and fluffed the pillow, thinking that I might as well be comfortable.

  What do people who are about to commit suicide think about just before they do it? I wondered. If they were angry at someone or something, they’d probably concentrate on that. If they were depressed, they’d probably see it as the doorway to a place where there was no depression. If they thought so little of themselves, as Hampton probably had, they’d see no reason to continue being who they were. Maybe they thought they’d become someone else, someone better, in another life or somehow brought back in another body. Maybe Haylee had been right about Hampton after all, and that applied to most suicides. They just wanted someone to feel terrible, to get some sort of revenge on people or a world that had treated them so badly.

  Should I think about Haylee? Should I fill my heart with hate and curse her as I slowly let the life drip out of me? Who would blame me? She certainly would do that if our roles were reversed. And yet there was the Kaylee in me remembering the good times we had together, our duets of laughter and squeals of delight, the two of us holding hands and walking together, falling asleep in each other’s arms when we were little, crying when one of us was in pain, maybe because we feared the same pain was about to happen to whoever didn’t have it yet but still crying just as hard as whoever was suffering. Sometimes we surely did that to please Mother, to assure her that we did more than sympathize with each other; we empathized.

  And what about those times when we got the things we both wanted, the dresses, the shoes, the toys? We gave each other conspiratorial looks of satisfaction. Either she or I had convinced Daddy or Mother to buy us whatever we longed to have. We learned how to play on our “twindom,” as Haylee liked to call it. “We’ll do some twindom today,” she might say, and then we would plot and plan, perfecting the way we would mimic each other when we wanted something.

  Once we were truly sisters, I thought. Should my last thoughts be about her then or be ugly, hateful thoughts about her now?

  Most people didn’t choose how they should die or where they should die. No matter how firm they were in their acceptance of what was inevitable for everyone, they refused to believe it would happen or happen too soon. Something would save them; someone would save them. And when death did come calling, did they surrender, or did they fight until there was no more strength, no more breath, and no more hope? Suicide was the last thing they would ever consider.

  “I’m not going to die,” Haylee had once told me. “I’ll make myself so ugly and mean that God won’t want me back.”

  Well, maybe you have succeeded in doing just that, oh sister of mine, I thought.

  Thanks to her, I didn’t have to find a reason to die today. I had only two choices, and I wouldn’t accept the second choice. I would not bring a child I could never want or love into this world. I would not be so wounded that I would have no hope of any other life or happiness. No one had found me. No one seemed to be trying, and with all my courage and determination, I had to accept that I could not escape.

  I brought the knife to my left wrist. I would slice deeply and then drop my arm over the side of the bed so I wouldn’t have to watch myself bleed. I would just feel weaker and weaker and maybe get sleepier and sleepier. It would be easy, almost as if it wasn’t really happening, once I was past the initial sting of the knife.

  Shouldn’t I be thinking a little about Mother or Daddy? Was I afraid that if I did, I wouldn’t cut myself? Despite everything, I didn’t want to imagine the pain and sorrow they would experience. Of course, I was confident that Anthony probably would bury me somewhere on his land, where no one would ever find me. To them, I would still be alive. They could keep convincing themselves of that and hold off the funereal thoughts.

  This was so much better for everyone.

  No more good-byes, no more regrets. I would finally escape.

  I pressed the knife to my wrist and closed my eyes, but just before I started to slice my skin, I felt something and saw that Mr. Moccasin had leaped onto the bed. This time, he had a just-killed mouse in his mouth and was sitting there with it as though he wanted me to praise him for his hunting skills. He dropped the mouse at his feet and then turned and leaped off the bed.

  Normally, I would have screamed or gotten sick to my stomach, but as if the cat had heard every one of my thoughts, he came up with a possible way for me to stay alive and be untouched, at least for a while longer.

  I sat up and poked the mouse with the front of the knife. Where I poked it, a tiny pool of blood appeared. I could never guess where I got the nerve to do it, but I reached out and picked up the dead rodent, squeezing it like an orange. Then I dipped the tips of my fingers into the blood and began smearing it on my nightgown, between my legs. After that, I put the dead creature under the bed, washed off the knife, and put it back. Then I waited.

  The moment Anthony stepped into the basement apartment, I started to cry. He stood there confused until I pointed to the bloodstain.

  “My period has come,” I said. “We have to wait.”

  His mouth dropped open with surprise.

  “You have to get me something.”

  “Yes,” he said. “I know where my mother kept her supplies. They’re old, but . . .”

  “That’s fine. Please,” I said, and he turned and hurried up the stairs.

  I looked at Mr. Moccasin, who was sitting there watching me and looking as contented as could be.

  I started to laugh. I couldn’t help it. I had been so tense and frightened of Anthony’s reaction.

  I laughed until I began to cry, which was how he found me when he returned.

  For the time being, he was full of sympathy and confusion, and I was suddenly full of new hope.

  19

  Haylee

  Everyone’s eyes were on me when I walked into my first-period class. There wasn’t a celebrity on television or in the movies who could have captured this much attention, I thought. Next thing you knew, some of them would ask for my autograph to prove that they really did know the famous
Fitzgerald twins.

  I looked straight ahead as I entered the room, keeping my face full of tension and pain and clearly appearing, I was sure, like someone who didn’t want to be there, be anywhere, for that matter. I’m sure they saw how subdued my makeup was and how what I was wearing was something I wouldn’t have normally chosen. I had no jewelry on, either, no earrings, bracelets, or necklaces. Some of the girls actually looked like they were going to cry for me. Even the boys seemed embarrassed by their own emotions and quickly looked away or down.

  “Sorry, I’m late, Mr. Madeo,” I said to our English teacher, and I sat at my desk with obvious reluctance and pain. I glanced at my sister’s empty desk while doing so and thought I heard an audible gasp from Melody Wilkes, who sat right behind Kaylee.

  “It’s all right, Haylee,” Mr. Madeo said. “We’re talking about the second act of Macbeth. It’s on page 235 of your textbook.”

  “I haven’t gotten a chance to read it yet,” I said. “Sorry.”

  “That’s fine. Just listen for now.”

  He looked totally off balance, which was something new for him. It would be new for all my teachers as they worked through how to speak to me. They’d all be afraid that they might cause me to start crying. I kept my eyes on my textbook for most of the period, but I didn’t read a word or hear much of what Mr. Madeo or anyone in the class said. I could feel everyone looking at me. Maybe they were afraid I would start sobbing uncontrollably whenever I chanced a glance at Kaylee’s empty seat. Once or twice, I took emphatic deep breaths and pressed the back of my hand to my mouth as if I was trying not to throw up.

  Seconds after the bell rang, the girls were around me, offering to do all sorts of things for me. I thanked them all, and then, like a princess walking down a red carpet, I made my way through the halls to my next class, keeping my gaze forward but collecting the looks of surprise and interest from all the others who saw me. Many started whispering to one another. The word of my arrival flew through the building, and before the bell rang for the next class to start, Ryan was there at the door, wanting to know why I hadn’t had him pick me up this morning.

  “It was a last-minute decision,” I said. “I didn’t think I’d have the strength to do it, but my father and our psychiatric nurse thought it was best if I tried to get on with normal life for now.” I said it loudly enough for all the students around us to hear.

  “Well, I’m taking you home,” he insisted. “And I’ll be there every morning to take you to school.”

  “Thank you, Ryan. You are so sweet and dependable,” I said, touching his cheek. He turned a shade of crimson. I left him looking a little stunned and took my seat again, this time in science class, one I hated. You had to pay too much attention and take too many notes, something Kaylee always did for us. Again, as it would do in every class, Kaylee’s empty desk shouted out more loudly to everyone because I was there.

  Ryan had moved so slowly after talking to me that he was late to his next class. When I saw him later, he said his teacher had warned him that he’d be in detention if it happened one more time. I told him he just couldn’t let that happen. Who would take me home? I made sure that everyone nearby heard me say that I didn’t want to put any more of a burden on my father’s shoulders. We were the center of attention. Those around us stopped talking to hear every word. I felt like there was a spotlight constantly on me.

  Time for a close-up, I thought, and smiled to myself.

  I didn’t know when I’d had a better time in school. There were so many girls around me in the cafeteria talking all at once that I could barely get a word in, much less my food. That was fine. My silence and lack of appetite confirmed everyone’s suspicions about how much I must be suffering. Ryan was at my side, but there were other boys looking at me now, and whenever I did sneak in a smile, it was for one of them.

  “I can’t imagine how terrible this is for you and your family,” Amanda Sanders told me as we all left the cafeteria. “I’m planning a house party this Saturday night and thought maybe you could come. It would help take your mind off it for a little while. Of course, I understand if you don’t think it’s proper or anything and . . .”

  “No, it’s a good idea,” I said, nodding. “My father wants me to slowly get back into things. Thank you.”

  “I’ll be sure to invite Ryan.”

  “Oh, invite as many boys as you want,” I replied, then forced a smile and left her fumbling for the right words to say. She didn’t want to sound too happy in front of me.

  Everyone was tiptoeing with words and smiles, unsure how to act with a girl whose twin sister had been abducted and could very well never be seen again. It amused me to see how this was true even for my teachers, the principal, and the guidance counselor, all of whom tried extra hard to make me comfortable.

  That first day, Ryan was a chatterbox when he took me home. Everyone knew that he had been visiting me, but seeing us together in school heightened his importance in their eyes. He described how he was always being interrogated about me and what he knew about my sister’s disappearance.

  “What did you tell them?” I asked. “I hope you didn’t tell any of your friends too much about us.”

  “Oh, no, no. They wouldn’t understand,” he said, making it sound like only he and I could.

  “No, they wouldn’t. They would get the wrong idea, and I would have only more pain. That would be the cruelest thing you could do.”

  He swore on the head of everyone he loved that he wouldn’t provide a detail about our time together. “All I tell them is that I’m happy I can keep you company.”

  “And how difficult it is for me not to cry all the time?”

  “Yes,” he said, even though he hadn’t said that. Now I was sure he would.

  “And how I was so depressed for a while that I actually thought about killing myself?”

  “No. Did you?”

  “Of course, Ryan. Kaylee and I were two parts of one person. It’s as if you lost half your body. What would you think of doing?”

  “You don’t think like that now, do you?”

  “Sometimes,” I said. “But not when I’m with you,” I added quickly, and washed the look of fear from his face.

  I could see his mind working. He was terrified of how my suicide would affect him. He’d be wondering if he could have done something to prevent it, maybe told someone. If I did it, he could be so full of guilt he wouldn’t know what to do with himself. “Look,” he said. “I know you can’t be yourself, enjoy yourself as much as you used to right now, but I promise I’ll make sure you have a good time no matter what. Whatever you want, you just tell me, okay?”

  “That’s very sweet, Ryan. You know I’ve decided to try to go to Amanda’s party this Saturday. At least, I told her I would, but I keep thinking that I won’t want to go when the time comes.”

  “Sure, I understand. But I’ll pick you up and stay right at your side all night. If you feel bad being there, I’ll take you home, even if it’s after only five minutes.”

  “We’ll see,” I said. “I probably shouldn’t have promised her I’d go.”

  “Everyone will understand if you change your mind. Don’t worry.”

  We pulled into my driveway. Mrs. Lofter’s car was there. Ryan started to get out to rush over and open my door. He was treating me like fragile china. If I wanted him to carry me to the doorway, he would.

  “Wait,” I said, before he got out of his car.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I just remembered that my father and the nurse took my mother to a real psychiatrist today.”

  “Oh.”

  “I don’t know what to expect, Ryan. Besides, I think the emotional strain of going to school was much more than I anticipated. I’m just going to go in and go to sleep for a while as soon as I can,” I said.

  “Right. Well, I’ll call you later.”

  “Thank you,” I said, and got out. I waved and smiled at him before I entered the house.

&
nbsp; By now, I hated the heavy silence that greeted me at home. Mother was often sedated and asleep. Mrs. Lofter would nod off in Mother’s room or go to hers. Sometimes I heard her playing the television with very low volume. Daddy was at work more often now. I never thought I’d be so happy to go to school, but the funeral-parlor atmosphere was starting to annoy me. Intending to go up and watch some television, I turned quickly toward the stairway, but Mrs. Lofter came out of the living room, surprising me.

  “Was it difficult?” she asked.

  “Was what difficult?”

  “Returning to school,” she said, her eyes wide with surprise that I hadn’t known what she meant.

  “Of course,” I said, making it sound like her question was pretty dumb. “Everyone, even my teachers, was overwhelming with pity and sympathy. I couldn’t even talk without choking up. I cried in the girls’ room about a dozen times.”

  She nodded. “It’s good for you to keep busy nevertheless.”

  “I know,” I said, following that with a deep sigh, one of my best, actually. Anyone might think I would close my eyes next and float to the floor like a leaf in the fall, too overwhelmed with the winds of sorrow to resist being torn away from the branch. I started again for the stairway, walking with my head down, my shoulders slumping with the weight of my sadness.

  “Just a moment, Haylee.”

  I turned, surprised at the commanding tone of her voice. “What?”

  “I’m still here because I’ve been waiting for you,” she said quickly, stepping closer. “I promised your father.”

  I looked up the stairway. “What’s happening now? Has there been something new about Kaylee?”

  “No, nothing that I know. Your father is with your mother,” she quickly continued.

  “With my mother? Where?”

  “Dr. Jaffe thought it best if we admitted her to his clinic now. Being here in this environment at this time is putting too much stress on her and reinforcing her condition. She’ll get more intense and frequent treatment at the clinic. You’ll be able to visit her when Dr. Jaffe thinks it’s appropriate.”