The scissors are in the drawer and I pick them up quickly and cut through Megan’s precious work. Through her crayon lines and inky trees. Through hearts, where her fingers have held the pen and made the shape over and over. I cut them all up into little pieces.
There’s a photograph of Kathleen and Megan, held tight to the fridge door by a magnet of a cherry cake. I cut that picture too and pick up all the shreds and carry them into the living room, where I drop them on the wooden table near the window.
The carpet under my feet keeps me silent, as I go to the corner shelf and pick up the photograph of Dad and Kathleen last summer. I take the thin wooden frame and bend it until it snaps and I spread its splinters on top of all the cut-up memories.
In the small drawer, by the empty fireplace, are the matches. I take them out and strike one, looking briefly at the clever yellow flame, until I drop it onto pictures that I never want to remember, that I wish had never existed. They curl slowly at the edges. Kathleen’s face twists and melts and lights the room with its glow.
But the flame has gone, leaving behind drips of charred paper, with half-formed pictures of Kathleen staring at me, telling me that I couldn’t even get this right.
I go into the kitchen and take every proud piece of paper framed carefully on walls and tacked to cupboard doors. I open drawers and empty them of Kathleen’s neat pile of household bills. In the hall, silently, I find her favorite scarf, waiting on its hook. I hate its smell and I cut it with the sharp scissors, ripping through the material. In the living room, I scatter it all among the ash on the wooden table.
I want to get rid of it. I want Kathleen to come down in the morning and I’ll watch her face as she sees the charred remains of the things she loves and she’ll know I’ve beaten her again. That every day I’m getting stronger and I’m slowly moving further out of her reach.
I strike a match and drop it onto the horrid little pile. I’d like to stay and see the flames flicker, but I know there’s more that I want to add, before it goes out again.
I run silently to the cupboard under the stairs, where Kathleen keeps her precious things. I turn on the dim light and open the box where the photographs are kept. Row upon neat row of Kathleen and Megan smiling. I look through them, even though I don’t want to. I want to forget their cruel faces. I search deep down to the bottom, to try to find one of my mom, but she’s not here. I can’t find one picture of her, tucked under the weight of all the others.
In the box next to it, I find some old schoolwork of Megan’s. I sift through it all. On a little scrap of paper, there’s a badly drawn apple and Megan’s name looking hesitant and shaky. “Six years old,” Kathleen has written in the corner.
Megan came here when she was six years old. My mother had drowned and here was a sister to make things better.
There’s a smell of smoke. I grab clutches of these pieces of paper and run back toward the living room.
The sofa, the carpets, the curtains are on fire. It’s all on fire. Black smoke curdles up across the ceiling.
I stare at the flames, so loud and angry that they’ll wake Kathleen.
And I know she’ll kill me.
I’ve burned her things. Her sofa, her chair. The curtains she spent so long choosing.
I run into the kitchen and fill a bowl with water, until the wet spills over the side. Across the hallway, the flames are bigger. It’s too hot to get close. The water falls onto them and does nothing.
The smoke is hurting me. It looks thick and solid. The fire is roaring and it’s covering my thoughts. There’s so much of it.
“Dad!” I call up the stairs. But I’m not loud enough—I know I’m not. I’m terrified that it’ll be Kathleen I’ll wake and she’ll throw me into the fire.
I know I have to get help. I try to go into the sitting room, to reach the phone, but my skin is boiling and the smoke is making me retch.
In the kitchen, I pull out drawers, trying to find Kathleen’s phone, or Dad’s. Any phone, just to get help. My eyes feel scratched as I yank at the cupboards, but there’s nothing.
I have to wake them.
The flames are on the stairs. My nightgown is on fire. I stamp it with my hands.
I have to get to Blister.
Blister will know what to do.
I unlock the front door and open it. I start to run.
Behind me, the house explodes into a ball of flames.
After
I remember only this.
•••
They found me down by the river. I was alone, smelling of smoke.
They told me that I had killed my dad and I had killed Kathleen. That Megan might die. She had jumped from her window, but she was too high up and already caught by flames. They said I had lit a fire and run away and left them there to die. I didn’t know what they meant. I had just wanted to burn the little things.
They took my hands and locked me up in a tiny room.
They said that I’d known the window keys were hard to reach. That maybe I’d even hidden them.
I cried that I didn’t, but they wouldn’t listen, that my dad was dead and I didn’t know why and I wanted to die too.
Vomiting, day and night.
They drove me in a van and strangers banged hard on the side.
I wore a suit that wasn’t mine, because all my other clothes were ruined.
The room was too big and I felt too small.
Fear raced through me so fast that it was difficult to stand up.
I didn’t understand what the judge said. He used words I’ve never heard.
Blister was there, but I couldn’t look at him, because I thought my heart would stop.
A lawyer sat with me. I said his name over and over in my head, to take away the other thoughts. Mr. Johnson, Mr. Johnson, Mr. Johnson, Mr. Johnson, until my head hurt too much and the smell of smoke seeped in again.
Two lines of men and women stared at me. The room was filled with words, about how I overturned tables and hit other children. How I didn’t have many friends.
My teacher told them that she never saw any sign of Kathleen hurting me, that I never mentioned a thing. Kathleen always seemed concerned and loving.
They thought I wanted to kill them all.
And I heard Blister shout out. I turned and saw Mr. Wick whisper something in his ear. But my Blister shook his head and started to cry.
The judge said something, but my body was shaking. Pain seared through my belly.
I’d never seen Blister cry before. His shoulders jolted up and down. I remember how he wiped his eyes beneath his glasses with the backs of his hands.
The judge said something else. The lawyer patted my arm and turned me to the front.
And all I could hear was Blister weeping.
After
five weeks later
The room is full. The judge is sitting at the front. He looks at me with a face so blank that I don’t know what’s inside his mind. He’s talking about my dad, but it hurts so much that I have to close my thoughts and take myself away to another place.
There are no windows and I’m finding it hard to breathe.
Mr. Johnson puts his hand on my arm. He needs me to listen.
“June Kingston,” I hear the judge say, “this court has prepared a comprehensive sentencing order, which is on file with the clerk.” I watch his mouth move underneath his mustache. He continues speaking. There is the word fire, but it spins out of my reach and holds the other words tight with it.
I feel Mr. Johnson tense beside me.
“Therefore, June Kingston, as to count one, you are judged guilty of the crime of attempted murder. For this crime, the court sentences you to life in prison, with no possibility of parole.”
“She’s just sixteen!” Mrs. Wick screams out into the room. I turn to her. She’s standing up, her arms thrown wide, as she looks toward the jury.
“As to count two, you are judged guilty of the crime of first-degree murder. For this crime, the co
urt sentences you to be put to death in the manner described by law.”
Everything stops.
My heart stops beating.
The world stops spinning.
I look to Mr. Johnson, because I can’t have heard the words that have just been said. He’s staring at the front, his hand tight on my arm.
“As to count three, you are judged guilty of the crime of first-degree murder. For this crime, the court sentences you to be put to death in the manner described by law.”
They want me to die.
“No!” Mrs. Wick is crying. But she can’t reach me.
The judge is speaking. Mr. Johnson is trying to talk to me.
“June Kingston,” the judge says, “you are hereby remanded, and without bail, to the custody of the sheriffs of the Coryell County, to be delivered to the commitment of the Department of Corrections, where you will be confined until final executions of this judgment and sentence prescribed by law.” He looks toward the jury. “This court is now in recess.”
Blister’s head is bent forward. His hands are shaking. He moves his thumbs around each other in endless circles, then he looks up at me.
They are helping me to stand, one on either side. My hands are clamped tight in the handcuffs. The noise of dragging metal follows me as I start to walk.
I think I might pass out, but they hold me up. I crane my neck to look at Blister. He’s standing up, his whole body shaking with tears.
“She’s just a child!” I hear Mrs. Wick cry.
We’re near the door. They’re taking me away. I look to the jury. Some of them are crying. Some of them have faces of stone.
“Please,” I whisper to them. “I didn’t mean to.”
The guard starts to open the door.
“June!” Blister yells, his voice cracking through the pain in my skull and reaching into my bones. “June!”
My legs give way. I try to stand, but they have to drag me out.
•••
I can’t see from the van. There are no windows and I’m in a cage. I want just a glimpse of the houses we pass. I want to see them change into flat fields. I want to see the trees and the sky.
I stare at the grille and count the lines. How many squares make up the whole?
But my dad comes through. His hands are blackened. I can’t look at his face.
I didn’t mean to do it, I tell him.
Kathleen is on the other side too. She’s pushing up against the metal, trying to get to me.
I put up my hands to block her way, but she squeezes the smell of her burning bones through the squares. It’s on my skin and every time I breathe I swallow it. Her death is inside me now.
Count to ten, Blister tells me. I close my eyes and imagine him here. He’s holding my hand and wiping the tears from my face. I’ll make you a paper rope to help you escape.
And I cling to him.
•••
The van stops. I wait for it to move again, but it doesn’t. It’s loud as the back door is unlocked and daylight knocks into me. I close my eyes, but only briefly. I can’t miss any of these last few minutes before they take me inside.
A woman unlocks the cage.
The monster gets out.
I step onto the ground and they start to move me.
“Wait,” I say. The men keep walking, leading me by my elbow. “Please. I just want to touch the earth.”
They look at each other and one loosens his grip. I bend down and place my bound hands on the ground. It is hard, covered with a layer of dust. It’s the color of white sand.
I don’t think I can stand up and they have to pull me straight. No one speaks to me as we walk. I keep the earth’s dust on my palms.
•••
This is more than terror.
They lead me through doors and gates with thick metal bars.
They put me in another cage and I have to take off my clothes. They watch me, naked, my flesh on show. My belly, my legs, my breasts, they see it all. There’s no corner for me to hide in and humiliation ripples over my bare skin.
They check my mouth. Under my tongue. In my ears. I’m prodded and squeezed.
I am given a paper dress. So that I can’t hang myself.
My body walks, but I’m not here. I’m racing fast in the blue air to reach Blister. I find him by a crossroads, waiting with a stone in his hand.
Left or right? he asks, putting his arms behind his back.
Left, I say, touching his hand. He unfurls his fingers and the stone is in his palm.
Left it is. He takes my hand and we start to walk.
The door is white, with bars sunk into the top half of it. They open it, then someone takes off the shackles around my ankles. I’m put inside the room. It’s no more than a box.
“This is it,” one of the men says.
It’s too small. They can’t leave me here.
But they do. They shut the door hard behind me. A slot in the door opens.
“Put your arms through.”
I do as they tell me. Through the bars, I see the man move the key to unlock the handcuffs. I bring my arms back through. The flap closes. It’s such a normal sound, just metal on metal, but it leaves me totally alone.
I stand staring out through the bars in the door. I don’t want to look at the cell. I’m scared that it might build a fear in me that will make me go mad.
The floor of the corridor outside is shiny gray. The strip-light reflects off it. Opposite, there is a white wall. I reach my arms out as far as they will go. It feels like dead air. I turn my palms upward toward the light.
I want to see my dad. I want to see my dad so much. I want him to wake me up.
There’s a noise behind me. I turn, frightened. There’s no one here. I pull my arms in. There’s not even anywhere for someone to hide.
But there’s definitely a whisper, hissing into the cell.
There’s a square vent on the wall above the slab of bed. I have to stand on the thin mattress to reach it.
“Hey, new girl.” There’s a faint voice. “You there?”
I touch the grille with my fingers.
“New girl. You there?”
I look back toward the bars in my door. I’m scared to speak and I’m scared to stay silent.
“New girl?” The voice travels from another cell to mine.
“Yes,” I whisper.
“Are you there?”
“Yes,” I say louder. The voice chuckles.
“My name’s Mickey,” she says. “How you doin’?” It’s difficult to hear. I have to push my ear right up close to the vent. “Not good, eh? Poor lamb. How old are you?”
“Sixteen.”
An exhale floats down the vent.
“That’s too young.”
My legs can’t keep me standing. I kneel on my bed, my hands flat on the thin blanket. My lungs aren’t working. I reach out with my fingers, as if to grab the air, but there’s none there.
“It’s OK, girl,” the voice says, somewhere in the distance.
The bars in the door blur into each other.
My breaths are too small. It’s not enough.
“You’ll get used to it.” And her faint laugh wheezes into the room, until I have to cover my ears and wait to disappear.
•••
I open my eyes. The room feels wrong. It’s too dark and the bed feels the wrong way around. I sit up in a panic. And then I remember.
Dad. Dad. Dad.
My heart is beating too fast. I’m in a cell and they never want me to get out.
The blanket is thin around my knees. The wall is cool behind my back and I try to make it calm me. Blister is telling me to count to ten. I want to, but my dad is pushing into my mind. We’re on our bicycles, laughing into the wind. He’s reading me a story. He’s throwing me high into the lake.
He was alive and I took it from him.
The wings beat in me. They fill me up and cram my throat.
They found him by the window. He almost e
scaped.
I can’t breathe. I go to the bars in the door, but the air is stale. And the wings have left no space in my lungs.
I want to tell my dad I’m sorry. That I didn’t mean for him to die. That I want him to come back.
I’ve never known fear like this. I’m a spider in the corner and they’re going to crush me. All I can do is wait.
•••
It’s Thursday. Four days since I arrived here. They say that Blister is coming to visit.
I have mosquito bites on my arms and face. I’ve scratched them raw and he’ll see them. My hair hasn’t grown enough. He’ll see that too.
I won’t be able to touch him. Not once. I won’t be allowed to feel his hand in mine.
But I’ll see him. He’ll be here.
•••
They handcuff me through the slit in the door. They walk me down the shining corridor. I couldn’t eat my breakfast and my stomach hurts. The light is making me dizzy.
The keys are loud as they lock and unlock.
I’m in a room divided into cages. In front of one stands an older woman. She smiles as she leans toward me.
“I’m Mickey,” she says. Mickey from the vent. Mickey who’s kept me alive these last four days. “My son and granddaughter are coming to see me.” She beams.
I’m shaking. My palms are sweating. I wanted to look nice, for Blister.
“You’ll be OK,” Mickey says, and she reaches over and squeezes my hand. The guard steps forward and moves me away into one of the cages. He points to the telephone handset hooked onto the wall.
“When your visitor comes, speak into that.”
Then he leaves, locking me in.
I sit down and look through the glass in front of me. It shows an empty room. The door on the back wall is closed. I stare at it.
Too many minutes pass. My chest feels clamped tight.
The door in the other room opens. A man comes in with a baby on his hip. Behind him, Mr. Wick walks through and with him is Blister. I start to cry. I don’t mean to, I didn’t want to.
Blister is crying so hard. He’s trying to look at me, but he can’t. His dad helps him to sit down on one of the chairs on their side, divided from other visitors by wire mesh.
Mr. Wick picks up their handset and I pick up the one on my side. It’s cold and heavy in my hand.
Paper Butterflies Page 17