The Patient

by Steena Holmes

  I ignore him.

  “Clean it up.” His voice doesn’t raise or lower. He is lord of this castle, and dealing with shit like this is beneath him.

  “I didn’t make the mess,” I say, challenging him to look me in the eye, but it’s a waste of time. He shovels another forkful of mashed potatoes into his mouth while looking over my report card.

  “You’re an ungrateful child, you realize that, right?” Mom shakes her head before getting up to grab a towel.

  She’s limping, and I know it’s from being tossed across her bed last night and onto the floor.

  Father dearest finally decided to come home after two weeks away.

  I wish he hadn’t.

  Why can’t he just leave already? Leave and never come back. Or better yet, drink himself into a ditch.

  “So help me, if you don’t get off your ass and clean your mess, I’ll make it so you’ll never be able to sit down again, do you hear?” This time his voice does rise, but only slightly.

  Oh my God, he does have feelings. Wonder what it would take for him to yell at me.

  But then he probably wouldn’t yell. Not at me. He’d take it out on Mom instead, and I’d end up feeling guilty for the bruises etched in my name.

  I push my chair back hard enough it scratches a mark into our cheap vinyl floor.

  He growls.

  I ignore him.

  “Here, let me do it.” I take the cloth from Mom as she limps back over. I toss the towel on the floor and use my foot to wipe it through the water.

  Mom sits down. I catch a faint whiff of vodka when I kneel down to grab the towel. I’m about to take it back to the kitchen, but another bearlike growl has me turning back.

  “Laundry.”

  “Fine.”

  He grabs my wrist as I march past him, his grip tighter than a stuck jam lid.

  “Disrespect your mother like that again and it’ll be the last thing you do.”

  I stand as still as a broken grandfather clock. My hand goes numb. His fingers are crushing the veins, and I know my wrist will be black and blue come morning. I’ll have to wear a long-sleeve shirt to cover it. Again.

  I try to wiggle my fingers to keep the blood flowing, but even that proves impossible.

  “Hurts, don’t it? Keep it up and next it’ll be broken.”

  I yank it from his grip the second I feel his hand let go.

  I don’t say a word as I head to the laundry room. Or when I return to the table.

  “You want to explain to me what this shit is?” He waves my report card in the air before dropping it.

  “Not really.”

  Mom gasps. “Don’t be stupid.” She says it quietly enough for me and only me to hear.

  “You want to try that again?”

  I want to push him like he pushes us, but not only will he take it out on me, Mom will feel the brunt of it too. As much as I hate her, I don’t want to see him hurt her.

  I wish Uncle were here. There’s no way Father would be like this if he were. I think he’s afraid of Uncle.

  He should be.

  My father is a fat old trucker. Uncle works out and has muscles. He threw my father across the room once after seeing a bruise on Mom’s face.

  My father wouldn’t get away with this crap if Uncle were here, and he knows it.

  I called Uncle last night, told him what’s happening to Mom, and he promised he’d come as soon as he could, but he was doing a job for a buddy. I know he wants to be here, that he feels bad for leaving. But no one knew my father would come home this weekend.

  “Are you proud of your grades? Have you suddenly turned stupid? Is your mother babying you too much? Well? Answer me.”

  “It’s boring.” I speak no lie. It is boring. Uncle says I’m the smartest person he knows. We work on my homework together, and I never get anything wrong. But the moment I’m in class, it’s like there’s a wall, and I can’t jump high enough to reach the top to climb over. Nothing makes sense then. The words won’t come, the numbers all jumble together, and no matter how hard I try, no matter how well I do at home when we practice and study, I can’t answer a single question on any of my tests.

  “She’s not stupid. My brother works with her every night.”

  My father scoffs. “There’s the problem right there.”

  “Then maybe you should be home and help me yourself.” The words blow out of me like an unjammed hose.

  He rises, his bulky frame filling the space and sucking all the breathable air from the room. Mom visibly shrinks in her chair.

  I straighten in my chair and lift my chin, expecting the worst.

  “You think you’re so tough, don’t you? You’re a goddamned teenager. Life’s been too easy on you, I see. I slave away for weeks on end, am a bloody stranger in my own home, and you have the nerve to treat me with disrespect?” He hovers over me, his towering form monstrous as spit flies from his mouth and onto the table.

  I refuse to back down, to let the terror churning in my stomach reflect in my eyes.

  Uncle says the only way to beat a bully is show him he means nothing to you.

  My father means less than nothing, if that’s possible. I hate him.

  I wish he were dead.

  I used to love him. I used to look up at him and believe I’d always be safe. I used to think nothing would ever take his love from me. He was my hero.

  Some hero. His arm rises, and I know he’s going to hit me.

  I imagine the strike, the power behind it, the way my flimsy chair will fall and I’ll be on the ground.

  I imagine my mom sobbing in her seat, not having the guts to intervene.

  I imagine my father looking at me with disgust.

  “What’s going on?”

  The sound of Uncle’s voice stops my father’s arm from propelling toward me.

  The sound of Uncle’s voice saves me.

  “I said what’s going on?” Uncle comes into the room and stands beside me, his one hand resting on my shoulder, the other fisted at his side.

  My father looks at Uncle, at me, notices his hand on my shoulder, and takes a step back.

  “You’re . . . you’re home early.” Mom’s timid voice holds a note of relief.

  “Not early enough, I see.”

  “I showed them my report card,” I say, trying to explain what’s going on.

  Uncle nods.

  “They don’t really mean anything, you know that, right?” he says. “Those lazy teachers assume everyone learns one way and then judge you based on their incorrect assumptions. You’re smarter than they give you credit for, and no tests will tell me otherwise.” The love and acceptance radiating from his eyes as he looks at me send tingles over my body.

  All my friends moon over him. They call him Uncle Abs because of his six-pack. They get jealous whenever they see us together, because they want the attention he gives me.

  The attention he gives only to me. They can be jealous all they want. He’ll never love them, never want them the way he does me.

  I’ve heard Mom and Uncle whisper at night when they think I’m asleep. I’ve heard her ask him to be careful with me, not to hurt me like he hurt her, to promise her he’s different. He tells her I’m different, that I’m special in a way no one could ever understand. He gets me when no one else does. He loves me in a way no one else will. He would never harm me.

  She believes him.

  “So now you’re her parent?” My father roars like a baby lion who believes his roar is ferocious, but in reality it’s only a pitiful meow.

  “Firefly, why don’t you go on up to your room?” Uncle picks up his bag and hands it to me. “Can you take that up with you? Don’t look inside, though, because there’s a gift for you.” The wink he gives me tells me he wants me to do the exact opposite.

  I grin like a girl about to lick the cake bowl and head up the stairs, ignoring everyone else in the room.

  I want to pause at the top of the stairs and listen in, but Uncle watch
es me as I climb, and he won’t say a word until I’m out of range and in my room.

  What he doesn’t know, though, is I can hear every word through a hole in my closet wall. The vent in there, when uncovered, makes it sound like I’m in the next room.

  “I thought we’d come to an agreement,” Uncle says as I listen in. “This wasn’t your weekend to come home.”

  “I can bloody well come home whenever I damn well please,” my father blusters.

  I imagine him puffing out his fat, ugly chest before sitting back down.

  “Can we not do this, please? It’s late, and we’re all exhausted,” Mom begs, pleads.

  I wonder if she knows how weak she sounds.

  I will never be like her when I move out of the house. I will be strong. Capable of anything. I’ll never let a man hurt me the way my father hurts her.

  “Why don’t you head up to bed, sis. I’ve got this. Your husband and I need to have a chat.” The authority in his voice sends a chill down my arms. When Uncle gets angry, he’s scary.

  He gets a look in his eyes that I swear can stop a man dead.

  I’ve always wondered if he’s ever killed someone. I think he has.

  “Sit back down in that chair, woman. He doesn’t get to tell you what to do.” My father almost chokes on his words.

  I imagine my mother trying to decide which side to step to. If she were smart, it’d be Uncle’s side. He’s the only one who’s protected her from my father, even though she doesn’t deserve it.

  Uncle says he’s getting tired of her, that one day soon he’ll have to do something about her.

  I don’t know what that means. I asked him once, but he said he’d share when he was ready. When I was ready.

  I think I’m ready.

  “I still need to tidy up the kitchen—”

  From the way she stops, I have no doubt Uncle gives her a look. I count how long it will take her to climb the stairs and head to bed. One second, two seconds, three seconds, four . . . and then the squeak of that second step happens.

  I scamper out of the closet, re-cover the vent, and sit on the bed.

  Will she come in? She rarely does anymore.

  There’s a soft knock, then the twist of the knob before she takes a step into my room, a sad smile on her face.

  “You called him, didn’t you?”

  I nod.

  “Thank you.”

  We share a look. A look that far surpasses the age and familial distance between us. A look that I know I’ll always remember.

  She views me as an adult in that moment. Someone with more courage, more strength than she’ll ever have.

  Before I blink, she’s gone.

  I creep to my door and open it an inch. I listen to hear if she locks her door, if she feels safe enough to now that Uncle is home.

  When Father comes home on weekends, he either sleeps on the couch or in his truck. Never in bed with Mom. Not anymore.

  Last night he did.

  Last night he forced his way in before she could lock the door.

  Last night I’d had to hear things no child should ever have to hear.

  I’ve never hated them more than I did last night.

  Him for being . . . him. Her for letting him be . . . him.

  I think about going back into my closet to listen in, but I know Uncle will ask, and I want to give him an honest answer.

  Instead, I open his bag and find a small gift inside.

  I pull it out, excited to see what he bought me.

  It’s the most beautiful nightgown I’ve ever seen. It’s a brown color with a pink ribbon on the hem and at the waist. It feels like satin. It’s wrapped around a book.

  A used copy of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

  The cover is tattered, the pages bent, and it has that musty smell.

  It is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever been given.

  I look at myself in the mirror, amazed at the tears in my eyes.

  Another person looks back at me.

  Someone with a sparkle in her eye, defiance in her face. Someone who wears the body of a young teen but has an old soul.

  Someone I don’t recognize but welcome all the same.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 21

  KILLER

  Fear is a wonder drug.

  The chain reaction it creates within our bodies is amazing. Prepare and protect. The adrenaline released into our bloodstream tells us to prepare. The goal of our inner reaction is to protect us from perceived threats.

  Even if we have no idea where that threat is coming from or when.

  I’ve been a student of fear. I grew up with its ever-hovering presence in my life until I was strong enough to fight back.

  Fear doesn’t control me. I control it.

  I can’t have anyone discovering my secret. I’m playing the role I was meant to play with perfection. No one suspects a thing, and I mean to keep it that way.

  During the day, I play the role of someone else. It’s not until I’m here, back at home, that I can relax and be whoever I want to be.

  Tonight I’m a hunter. A watcher.

  I’ve been watching a family for the past little bit.

  I’m watching a few families.

  My judgment has been delayed, but tonight will tip the scales toward either life or death.

  Drip. Drip-drip. Three drops form a small puddle. The elixir of life soaks into the carpet, the stain growing with every drip from the knife in my hand.

  The parents. Dead. Blood pools beneath them, soaking the covers, sheets, mattress.

  I watched them earlier from their backyard, hidden behind the walnut tree, as the father slapped his son for a dropped glass of milk. I cringed as he was spanked. I broke as his tears fell, cries rang, and sobs carried over the wind from his open window.

  It was hard to sit and wait. Harder still to not rush into the home and stop the father.

  I could have called the police. I could have rung their doorbell. I could have done any number of things to stop the breaking of that little boy’s heart, but I didn’t.

  That’s on me.

  This . . . this is on them. I was willing to walk away tonight, to leave them be, keep my promise that I would stop. Willing until the milk dropped.

  They didn’t have to die.

  I want to spit on the bed. I want to turn back time and be slower, savor the kill. I acted too fast, too hastily. They deserved slow deaths. Painful deaths.

  I focus on the scene, memorize every last detail. It’s time to stop. I’ve killed too many too soon. I’ve been impatient.

  I hit the talk button on the kitchen’s cordless phone and dial.

  “Nine-one-one, what is your emergency?”

  “This is the Cheshire Mad Queen.” The name the press gave me is fitting. “Your presence is requested at 342 Hatter Lane. Front door is open. Keep your voices down. There’s a little boy fast asleep. His room is the first right at the top of the stairs. I suggest taking him from the house before he notices all the blood, and yes, there is quite a bit.” I place the phone back down on the counter and take a photo off the fridge.

  He really is a sweet thing. Big blue eyes, wide forehead, even wider smile. It’s not his fault he’s different and a little clumsy. He deserves a family who will accept him for who he is, not punish him for it.

  I slide through the back door, cross the yard, and pause on the other side of the fence. With careful precision, I undress and roll the clothes along with the hat, gloves on both my hands, and shoes into the waiting backpack. With a gentle swipe of a makeup wipe, I clean my face, and then I make my way down the back alley and enter the west side of Wonderland Park before the faint scream of sirens fills the air.

  They are too late.

  They are always too late.

  The wheat field dances in the glow of the moonlight, and the husky song of nature is my dance partner as I trail through the rows in search of something no longer there.

&n
bsp; Control is a beast that can never be tamed, and yet I’ve tried over and over and over. I’ve failed more times than I prefer to count. Each of those times, the repercussions have almost destroyed me.

  I thought my time here would be different.

  I hoped it would be. I had high expectations and planned things to ensure past practices wouldn’t be repeated.

  Fuck.

  I’m my own worst enemy.

  What am I supposed to do now?

  Hell if I know.

  I received a warning last night. A warning from him. He scares me. We have an arrangement—I follow his orders and he lets me do what I want. Unless I go too far.

  His warning is that I had better fix this mess I created before he has to. A warning I’d better heed.

  Fuck.

  There has to be another way to handle this fuck-fest.

  In the distance, a light in the window at home beckons me. That call, it holds a promise of what could be, of what was.

  That window represents all the good in my life. The small illumination that breaks through the darkness, that casts a glow and offers a welcoming path. It is my heart. It’s who I am.

  I am that light breaking through the darkness. I am that path leading those I love away from the abyss of darkness, of annihilation.

  I’m the Protector. I can’t forget that.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  THURSDAY, AUGUST 22

  I didn’t recognize the face of the woman who stared back at me. She was pale. Exhausted. Haggard. I turned away from the mirror in Dr. Brown’s office and sat down on the couch.

  I still wasn’t sleeping. What if someone broke in again and left another note? I didn’t feel safe in my own home. I pulled the light knit wrap tighter around my chest, my fingertips frozen because my body was running on fumes.

  Dr. Brown didn’t say much as she held a glass of water and looked over my file. What was she reading? I wanted to lean forward to read it, to peek at her notes, but I didn’t.

  “There’s a few things I’m concerned about,” she said after what felt like an hour of silence. “The first being your sleeping patterns. I’m not sure that you should be seeing your patients as often as you are if you’re not sleeping. It affects your cognitive ability, and you won’t be of any help to them.” She waited for my response.