by Amy Reed
Iz
From: yikes!izzy
To: condorboy
Date: Monday, February 20—6:48 PM
Subject:
Fuck, I’m yelling again. Sorry. I CAN’T DO ANYTHING RIGHT.
From: yikes!izzy
To: condorboy
Date: Monday, February 20—11:39 PM
Subject: ART!!!!!!!!
I can’t sleep again, but it’s a good thing because now I can stay up all night and work on my art, which I’ve been neglecting because of trying to do my FUCKING SCHOOLWORK because everyone was trying to make me feel guilty about my grades dropping. And I believed them; I let their little jabs of shame get inside me and distract me from what’s really important. Does Calculus feed anyone’s soul? Do mathematicians feel enlightened when they figure out some stupid equation? I don’t know, I am not a mathematician. I AM AN ARTIST. I am a stupid, confused teenager, but I am also an artist, and I have a right to call myself that even though the only galleries I’ve shown at are my bedroom and my sister’s condo. But maybe art isn’t about who sees it, maybe all that matters is me and the thing I make, me and the act of creating, those few moments stuck together where you’re elevated above this pathetic, polluted world, when you’re covered in paint or plaster and you’re talking to God with your hands and eyes and your big, pounding heart saying all the things you’ve ever needed to say, the movement, THE INTENTION your only language, and it’s bigger than words, bigger than your mouth forming recycled sentences and exclamations and all those sad, repeated things. There is only value in the things that have never existed before. This canvas with these strokes and these colors and these textures HAS NEVER EXISTED BEFORE. YOU and ME and THIS are the only things that matter.
Iz
From: yikes!izzy
To: condorboy
Date: Tuesday, February 21—1:08 AM
Subject: suck
It’s not right. None of this is turning out right. It was and then it wasn’t and I don’t know where the line was drawn and I don’t know who drew it. All I know is everything has fallen apart. Everything is upside down and tangled and everything I do just makes it worse, all my attempts to clean up the mess end up spilling and ripping and crushing it to pieces until it’s nothing but garbage, all my hard work and heart turned into garbage, and nothing I wanted to say got said, nothing I saw inside got out, and all I’m left with are slivers of something that could have been wonderful but ended up the OPPOSITE of wonderful and now I don’t know what to do. I’m awake and covered with paint and I don’t want to leave my room because someone will try to talk to me but I have to pee and I haven’t eaten all day and why is it always so hard to make something special happen?
Iz
From: yikes!izzy
To: condorboy
Date: Tuesday, February 21—4:27AM
Subject: doppelganger
Connor,
I have an evil twin. She looks just like me and goes around and does bad things and gets me in trouble. She gets mad and breaks my paintbrushes and calls me a failure. She climbs onto the roof carrying all of my disasters. She doesn’t care that it’s three in the morning. She doesn’t care that her hair is wild like Medusa’s, that she’s been wearing the same ratty pajama pants for two days. She doesn’t care that it has started to snow, that the little flakes are sticking to the frozen grass two stories beneath her. She’s in a tank top but she can’t feel cold. She spits at the snowflakes, at their legendary uniqueness, at their promise that no two are alike. FUCK YOU, she says to the snowflakes. FUCK YOU, she says to everything that’s supposed to be special and unique and one of a kind. She spits and her spit becomes just another snowflake, just another frozen wetness on the ground.
The girl has a lighter. I don’t know why she has a lighter. Maybe she smokes to spite me, because she knows it is something I would never do. Even with the sky full of big, goofy snowflakes, lighters make fire and fire reduces garbage to ash and at least ash can be useful. So the girl makes fire with the garbage, with the ripped canvas and the broken brushes still wet with paint. Who cares about what I intended? Who cares about what that garbage could have been if nimbler hands had touched it? This girl, my evil twin, she is the true artist. She can harness fire and make it do her bidding. What good is paint against something like that?
Did you know bad art burns hotter than anything? It is true. I felt it. I felt my face turn orange with the reflection, I felt my lips chap and my hands blister, I felt everything destruction feels like before the sirens tore the sky apart, before the spinning lights of danger unplugged all the electricity and left us with garbage again.
And that’s when she left, of course—my evil twin, that bitch. Just in time for trouble, she was gone, and there I was, on the roof with the lighter in my hand and the bathrobed neighbor pointing, the policeman saying something I couldn’t hear, my mom my dad everyone saying things I couldn’t hear. I could not tell them about the girl because I knew they would never believe me. So I came down like they told me. I handed over the lighter and the charred remains of something dead that I had wanted to be beautiful.
Love,
Iz
From: yikes!izzy
To: condorboy
Date: Tuesday, February 21—7:16 AM
Subject: donuts
Dear Connor,
So have you and Jeremy consummated your love yet? Have you met any sexy college girls? Have you been to any wild parties? I know you’re on the road and everything, but don’t you have one of those fancy phones with internet? Can’t you borrow someone’s laptop for a couple minutes to write me a quick note reminding me I’m not alone in the world? I’m at a point where I might even be desperate enough to CALL YOU ON THE PHONE, except, if I remember correctly, I refused to take your number when you offered it to me so many months ago.
Don’t worry, I’m not going to jail just yet. White girls in good neighborhoods can get away with murder these days. All that happens is they get sent to their room to clean up the wreckage (we must keep up appearances, yesyesyes) while the parental units drink organic free-trade coffee with the policeman downstairs. I wonder if he can taste the difference. Do Seattle cops have better taste in coffee? Do they like donuts as much as people say? Or would it be scones here? Croissants? Something fancier? What do cops in Beverly Hills eat? Do they even have donuts in Beverly Hills?
The cop told my parents to be stricter about making me see the shrink. And to make me take a drug test. Ha! In the history of teenagers taking drug tests, I will be the first one that comes out legitimately clean! It’ll be all over the news. I’ll be a hero to kids everywhere. Maybe the assholes at school will actually start talking to me. No, let’s not go too far.
My mom says she doesn’t know what to do with me. So I said, “Why do you have to do anything with me?” Then I had to go back to my room. It’s funny how they think it’s a punishment to be alone in my room with all my beloved stuff, when really that’s the only place I can stand to be in this cruel, horrible world. A real punishment would be making me hang out with them all day. But I guess that would be torture for them, too, so I don’t expect anyone to suggest that option anytime soon.
I don’t think I can keep this up much longer. But it’s like I don’t even have a choice. I wish there was a switch that could just turn me off for a little while, let me recharge. LET ME SLEEP. Do you have any idea how that feels? To be soooooooo tired but no matter what you do, you can’t sleep? When I die and go to hell, that’s what it’s going to be like: Hanging out with my parents and having to do math homework and not being able to sleep.
I wish you were here to sing me lullabies.
Love,
Iz
From: yikes!izzy
To: condorboy
Date: Wednesday, February 22—12:22 PM
Subject:
Shit. ShitshitshitshitshitshitSHIT. Every time I think things couldn’t possibly get any worse, I am proven wrong, I get a big, fat reminder saying, ISABEL,
YOU’RE DOOMED. How could you possibly think you have anything good to hold on to? A sister you can trust? BULLSHIT. Now she’s the enemy too. Now she’s on their side, with her tricky Do you want to come over, Isabel? Do you want to have dinner with me and Karen tonight? And I naively think they’re asking because they’re the last two people on earth besides you who don’t hate me. I think maybe I can go over there and feel some peace for a second. Maybe I can sit on their couch and drink some tea and watch a movie and feel for a couple hours like the world isn’t falling apart and that maybe I have a place in it. But I’m asking too much. I AM ALWAYS ASKING TOO MUCH. And I’m sorry I’m yelling again but I can’t help it because NO ONE EVER LISTENS TO ME and you’re not listening to me, you’re probably off in the woods doing Ecstasy with some hot college girl who’s giving you a massage while she purrs about how reading Derrida has changed her life, and these words I’m writing are just going to some sad, mysterious place where unread emails go to die.
She’s on their side now. My beloved sister has forsaken me too. It was all planned and choreographed and scripted and rehearsed like some crappy reality show where the only point is to humiliate some dumb, unsuspecting schmuck who doesn’t know what’s coming. And everyone watching at home is laughing their pants off, everyone’s making bets on what’s going to happen when she finds out she’s been punked and then totally loses it on national television. Will she start crying? Will she scream? Will she get violent? Will she become still and silent and slowly quiver her way into a straightjacket?
Just so you know, if you ever want to be COMPLETELY DEAD TO ME, all you have to say are these simple words: “Mom wanted me to talk to you.” That’s all you need to say to assure me you’ve officially become the enemy, that you’re doing her bidding and you’ve conspired behind my back. All you have to do is feed me spaghetti and wait until I’m sufficiently full and sleepy, then sit me down on the couch and say, “I have something I want to talk to you about.” And you want to know the saddest part? You want to know the part that’ll just make you cringe? For a second, my stomach flipped and I got a little tingly feeling in my skin, and I smiled, I actually smiled, because do you know what I thought she was going to say? DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA? For a brief second before she became a traitor, I actually believed my sister was about to ask me to be her baby’s godmother. How incredibly pathetic is that?
Karen was in the kitchen doing the dishes and there we were, sitting in the living room, me with a stupid grin on my face because I had no idea I was about to be thrown under the bus. I was trying to hide how excited I was, preparing to stay calm after she popped the question. But as she opened her mouth, I saw it. I saw the look on her face that said she was scared, that this was not going to be good news, that she was about to break my heart. And then she said it. “Mom wanted me to talk to you.” And I only heard snippets of what she said after that, words and phrases like daggers one after another after another after another.
You’ve been acting strange, Isabel. Your behavior has been erratic. Problems at school. The stunt with the fire. The cops. Is it drugs, Isabel? You can tell me if it’s drugs. We can get you help. Why don’t you let us help you?
Us. She said US. She is in a unit with them now. US is not me and her anymore. Us means THEM now. And I’ve been thrown into the category with my brother. They think I’m as bad as the heroin addict locked up in the mountains.
So I left. I just grabbed my stuff and walked out the door. Gennifer tried to stop me, kept trying to tell me she loved me and was trying to help, but all her words bounced off of me. Karen came in and said, “Where are you going?” and I just shrugged. Where could I go? I wasn’t allowed to go anywhere except school and home and my sister’s condo, and now I only had two of those places left. My world is getting smaller and smaller, and pretty soon I’ll lose everything, I’ll destroy every single thing I have until all I’ll have is a rock to stand on, a little speck of dirt, and then even that will disintegrate and I’ll be left with nothing.
They kept talking and I kept leaving, and I could hear Gennifer getting on the phone to call my parents, her new allies, and I walked out the door and shut it calmly behind me and got in my car and put on my seat belt and drove the ten minutes home clenching every muscle in my body, and I think I was breathing, I must have been breathing, but I don’t remember there being any air, any movement inside me. I pulled up outside my house and got out and locked the door and walked inside and didn’t even look at my parents who were standing in the living room waiting for me, didn’t raise my head to look them in the eyes, barely heard their “Your sister was worried about you. She didn’t think you were coming home. Isabel. Talk to us. Isabel. Where are you going?” and I just went where I always go, to my little box where I don’t bother anyone. And as soon as I closed the door behind me, all the sounds and pain I’d been avoiding came rushing out of me and I couldn’t hold on anymore, I couldn’t hold on, and I melted onto the ground and everything came out, the air and tears and pain and heartbreak, and it sounded like something deflating, it sounded like Esteban’s mother in Ecuador, screaming at God for taking the only good thing she had left in this empty, dirty world.
I don’t know how long I stayed on the floor like that, how loud I was crying, if my mouth was forming words or sentences, if anyone came in or out or tried to soothe me. All I know is I woke up covered with a blanket and with a pillow under my head, with my throat sore and my eyes puffy and stinging, bruises on the palms of my hands where my nails dug in. There was a bottle of water, a glass of juice, a banana and a muffin sitting on my desk. I am trying to eat the banana as I type this to you. But every time I try to swallow I feel like I’m going to throw up. And something about that just seems so devastating, the fact that I can’t even feed myself, that my body hates me so much it doesn’t even want to let me eat.
Connor, please write me back. I just need to know you still exist.
Love,
Iz
From: yikes!izzy
To: condorboy
Date: Wednesday, February 22—2:46 PM
Subject:
It’s Wednesday, Connor. You’re supposed to be back by now. Did the forest swallow you up? Are you turning into wood, into rock, into pine needles? Are you scattered across the forest floor, softening the deer’s hoofbeats?
Connor? Are you there?
From: yikes!izzy
To: condorboy
Date: Wednesday, February 22—4:40 PM
Subject:
Please?
From: yikes!izzy
To: condorboy
Date: Wednesday, February 22—8:19 PM
Subject:
Connor, I need you.
From: yikes!izzy
To: condorboy
Date: Wednesday, February 22—11:17 PM
Subject:
She is winning, Connor. My evil twin. I don’t know where the real me stops and she begins. She runs and runs and I follow, and it’s getting easier, this racing around. The track is part of my feet, her feet. I am strangely calm. I am focused. Everything is clear all of a sudden. The pain comes from the struggle, not from the girl. She wants me to stop fighting. She promises me there will be no conflict. She whispers and her voice is soft. It is not the sound of evil. She says, Let go. She says, Relax. She says, Don’t you want to stop fighting? And I say yes. She says, Close your eyes. And I do. Then she takes over and I feel myself slipping, and the falling feels like freedom.
From: condorboy
To: yikes!izzy
Date: Thursday, February 23—4:43 PM
Subject: Re:
Dear Isabel,
I’m home now. I was so excited to turn on my computer and write to you about what a great time I had on my trip. But now there’s this. There are pages and pages of your fear and pain and paranoia for me to sift through and try to answer.
Isabel, you’re scaring me. This isn’t just part of your lovable eccentricity anymore. Something is really wrong, and I don’t know
how to help you. Maybe your sister went about it the wrong way, but she really was trying to help. She’s not the enemy and neither are your parents. They may not understand you, but they love you the only way they know how.
Fuck, I feel like whatever I’m going to say is going to piss you off. Anything I want to tell you is going to be taken the wrong way and you’re going to make me a villain like you’ve done to everyone else. I love you, Isabel. So please hold on to that when I tell you I think you need help. Professional help. Whatever’s going on is too big for us to handle. It is bigger than me and your sister and your parents. It’s bigger than school and Trevor and your art. It is bigger than you, Isabel. It is so much bigger than you.
Don’t listen to her. Don’t give yourself to whatever sickness is posing as your evil twin. The softness of her voice is all part of the trick. Please. Try to believe me. And please don’t hate me for wanting to help you.