BEAUTIFUL HELL
Contents
Prologue
1. Kira
2. Kira
WHEN WE WERE YOUNGER
3. Kira
4. Kira
WHEN WE WERE YOUNGER
5. Elias
6. Kira
7. Kira
WHEN WE WERE YOUNGER
8. Kira
9. Kira
WHEN WE WERE YOUNGER
10. Elias
11. Elias
12. Kira
13. Kira
14. Elias
15. Kira
WHEN WE WERE YOUNGER
16. Kira
17. Kira
18. Elias
19. Kira
20. Elias
21. Kira
22. Kira
23. Kira
24. Kira
25. Elias
26. Kira
27. Elias
28. Elias
29. Elias
30. Kira
Epilogue
STAY CONNECTED
Prologue
“Kira! Don’t go too far, honey!”
My mom is always worried about me, especially when we’re out in Central Park. I don’t know why, though. It’s a nice place, with lots of big trees and squirrels and pretty flowers. People in funny and super tight outfits running around. Grownups, mostly, but plenty of kids, too…
I don’t get why she’s always so afraid. I’m not a baby anymore. I just turned six!
The sun is out, and the sky is a beautiful blue. My dad says it’s the perfect day to be out as a family. He’s with mom on a picnic blanket, at the top of a small hill. We drove into Trinity Park from Hampton Heights, where our house is. It’s a huge place, my home. So huge that I sometimes get lost in it, but I always have fun trying to find my way back to the living room. The girls at school say I live in a castle, but I’ve seen castles in picture books. My house doesn’t have towers or… ugh, what’s it called? The ditch with water around the castle… Mot. No, moat! Moat. My house doesn’t have towers or a moat, so it’s not a castle. It’s just a really big house.
Mom says we’re fortunate to have such privileges. I don’t understand that word very well yet, but I’m getting there. Thanks to mom, I’m never really left in the dark, not even when it comes to big words and all that. She’s patient and loving and she explains everything fifty times, if that’s what it takes for me to get it. She says I’ll understand the world a lot better and faster when I grow up. Dad agrees.
“Kira!” Mom shouts after me. I’m at the bottom of the hill. The sun dances in my hair, and there are butterflies everywhere.
“I’m not going far!” I shout back, not letting the butterflies out of my sight.
They’re so pretty! Blue and black wings, fluttering around. One of them is actually orange and white and black… and really big. I follow it around, as it strays from the others. I hear dad laughing, telling mom not to worry so much about me. That she’s too protective sometimes. That I’m a big girl.
“She’ll be fine, Carrie,” he says. “You’ll drive yourself into an early grave if you keep worrying about her like this.”
“I can’t help it. Our only child,” she reminds him.
I know I’m an only child, though I would’ve liked a little sister. But I know they’re not looking to give me one. They say that every Christmas, when they ask me what I want Santa to bring me, and I tell them I want a little sister. Or even a little brother, if Santa’s out of little sisters.
The butterfly takes me around the hill, behind a big family of oak trees and stuffy bushes. I can’t see my parents from here, but I can hear them talking. Mom laughs a lot, especially at dad’s jokes, even though they’re not all that funny—she told me that, once.
A lady is walking her golden retriever as she passes by me. The dog is big and beautiful, with a pale blond coat, similar to the lady’s. I heard something silly once, even though it might be at least a little bit true. Someone said that dogs can look a lot like their owners and in this case, I see what they mean. The lady smiles at me, and I smile back. Her dog scurries forward a little, then moves closer and sniffs me. I bend down and giggle when he licks my face. He’s adorable. I think he likes me.
I’m all slobbery but oh, so happy.
“Can I pet him?” I ask the lady. Mom taught me to always ask when it’s not my dog. The lady nods, her smile getting bigger and warmer. I like her.
“Of course, honey. Sally here is a sweetheart,” she says.
“Sally. So, it’s a girl.”
She nods again, and I pet the top of Sally’s head, gently stroking the back of her neck afterwards. Sally loves it. She wags her tail and… I can swear she’s smiling at me! We should come to the park more often. Maybe I’ll see Sally again.
“Elias, come here, honey,” the lady calls out to a boy. He’s farther behind her, with a remote control and a small monster truck toy. He’s busy steering it straight down the alley. He looks a little bit like her. He’s got her soft green eyes. His hair is blondish-brown and all messy, but it’s kind of cute. His knees are scabbed, like mine and I don’t know why I find it so funny, but I laugh a little as I take him in.
The lady bends over, so she’s closer to my height. “What’s your name, honey?” she asks me.
I’m still busy with Sally, but I manage to answer. “Kira. Nice to meet you.”
“Nice to meet you, too,” she says. “I’m Mary. And this here… is Elias. My son.”
The boy reaches us, his truck stopping at my feet, inches from my toes. I wiggle them in my strappy pink sandals, but I’m not scared. It’s just a toy. It can’t hurt me.
I look up at Elias, and he gives me a smile. “Hi,” he mutters.
“I’m Kira!” I reply, reaching out. I hope he’s nice like his mom.
He shakes my hand! Again, I can’t help but giggle. It makes him laugh, too. I think we’ll get along really well. Elias looks at me like we’re friends already. I can tell. Mom says I am always able to tell when people like me. It’s an instinct, she once told me.
“Where are your parents, Kira?” his mom asks me, and I point behind me, somewhere beyond the bushes and the oak trees.
“Just up the hill there. We’re having a picnic,” I say. “Do you want to have a picnic with us?”
I hope they say yes. The lady laughs lightly. “I think that’s up to your parents, honey. And, of course, my husband. Martin, darling!” she calls out to a man in a dark blue suit. He’s on his cell phone, walking slowly. I didn’t even notice him until she pointed him out.
He comes over but doesn’t hang up. My dad gets like that sometimes, too. All caught up in his phone and business…business…business.
“What is it?” he asks. He feels cold. I’m not sure I like him. I don’t know why, but my skin tickles, like when I’m watching a horror movie, and the monster is about to come out. I’m not allowed to watch horror movies, but Margaret is a good nanny. She plays them on her laptop sometimes.
“Kira here wants us to join her and her parents for a picnic,” the lady says, almost laughing. I must have said something funny.
The man, Martin, looks down at me and flashes a smile—it’s not a real smile. It’s fake. I can feel it in my bones.
“Thanks, sweetheart, but we have a dinner reservation in about a half an hour. Another time, maybe,” he says, then whispers to the lady. “Picking up little girls in the park?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Martin,” the woman replies. She’s upset. “Sally pulled me to her. We were just
making conversation.”
Martin rolls his eyes and goes back to talking on the phone. Something about business and supermall. I think my dad mentioned a supermall a few times, as well. He talks about it a lot during dinner, though my mom isn’t really all that interested. Neither am I. His business stuff bores me.
“So, how old are you?” Elias asks me.
I smile again. I can’t help it. He’s just so nice. If I was allowed to have crushes. I think maybe I’d have a crush on him. “I’m six,” I say, hoping my cheeks don’t tint the color of tomatoes. “Almost seven. You?”
“I’m almost seven too!” he replies, and he seems so proud. “Do you live in Trinity?”
I shake my head and then nod. “No…well, yes. Kinda. In Hampton Heights. It’s not all that far away from Trinity. We have a big house there. It’s got a pool.”
His green eyes grow wide and round. “Really? We live in Hampton Heights, too!”
“That’s cool!” I reply.
“You can come over and we can play with Sally together! She loves the water sprinklers in the garden,” Elias says, and he laughs a little. “She’s so funny!”
“Kira!” my dad yells, and I freeze for a moment.
I hear him coming down the hill. Turning around, I see him as he comes around the bushes, his face red with anger. I made him mad. “I’m here, dad…”
“I told you not to get too far away from-.” He stops and frowns at the lady, then at Elias, at Sally, and ultimately at Martin. “What the fuck are you doing here?!”
I gasp, covering my mouth with both hands. Mom catches up, almost rolling down the hill, looking all nervous and scared, but her worries all go away when she sees me. “Kira, honey, what did we say about going too far?”
“I told you I got this, Carrie,” Dad reprimands her. Why is he so angry?
And why is Martin all stiff and red-faced, all of a sudden? I don’t get it.
“Out of all the places in the world,” he mutters, shaking his head with disgust.
“William, what’s going on?” Mom asks Dad, suddenly confused. She doesn’t know these people, but dad clearly does. The lady, Elias’s mom, she knows him, too.
“Stay away from my family,” Dad says, scowling at Martin. They hate each other, that much is obvious. “I don’t want you dragging our wives and children into this!”
“William?” Mom asks again, but Dad shushes her. He scares me when he’s like this.
I look over to Elias. He doesn’t understand, either. “Daddy, why are you angry?” he asks Martin, who grabs his wrist and pulls him away. Sally is getting restless. She’s not happy about the way everyone is acting, either. I bet she’s also a little bit scared, just like me.
“Come on, we’re leaving,” Martin says. “Not wasting our family Sunday arguing with that piece of shit!”
Mom is shocked, her eyes wide as she sucks in a breath. It’s twice I’ve heard curse words in like… five minutes. My cheeks are burning red. I think maybe I’m a little bit angry too…and a little bit sad.
“Martin!” the lady calls after him, but he doesn’t care. He drags Elias farther away, and Elias is looking at me, wanting to stay…
The lady gives up, her shoulders dropping. She gives me an apologetic smile as she tugs Sally’s leash. “I’m sorry honey. Maybe in another lifetime.” She looks at dad, frowning. “You’re an awful human being, William Malone.”
“Oh, yeah? Have you seen the guy you married?” Dad replies, waving her away. Mom takes him by the arm, but he yanks it back. “Get the fuck off me, Carrie! You have no idea what an asshole Martin Dressler is!”
The lady leaves, and Sally goes with her. I feel alone, all of a sudden, watching Elias go. We were going to play with Sally by the sprinklers in his garden. I was going to invite them to our house, to swim in the pool, too. I don’t get it.
“You ruin everything,” Mom says. There are tears in her eyes, but she doesn’t allow them to fall. She shakes her head at dad and starts walking back up the hill.
Dad is breathing heavily. He’s obviously still furious. I don’t even think he knows how upset mom is. He looks at me as if I’m responsible for all of this. A knot forms in my throat, and I swallow it back. Sometimes dad scares me.
“Get your ass back up to the picnic blanket,” he grumbles, and I don’t wait to be told twice. “If I ever see you talking to that kid again or anyone in that fucking family, I’ll send you to a boarding school in Switzerland.”
I know he means it. When Dad uses that tone, he means it. Like when he told me that if I’m out on my bike after eight in the evening again, he’ll take the wheels off and throw the bike away. I didn’t believe him, and the next day I found my bike outside on the curb, next to the trash can, with its wheels screwed off. I tried to get it back, but he grabbed me by the hair and pulled me back to my room, telling me I was grounded.
Dad confuses me sometimes. He can be so good and kind and sweet. But then he just turns into this bad man, and I can’t do anything about it. Mom’s scared of him, too, but she says she loves him. He just loses his temper, she says, that’s all. He’s always sorry about it later.
Who cares about later?
“Why can’t I be friends with Elias?” I ask as I walk up the hill, the bright sun making me squint my eyes. Ahead, mom is already packing the food and stuffing it into the basket. I think we’re leaving sooner than we wanted to; without even really getting started on our picnic.
“Elias and everybody else with the Dressler last name are bad people, and you would do well to stay away from them!” Dad replies. “Martin is my enemy, and he’s not above messing with my family just to get to me. You hear me, kid?!”
I nod slowly, though I don’t understand it very well. Right now, dad feels a lot like the enemy. Maybe mom will explain all of this to me later. I just can’t believe that Elias is a bad person, like Dad says, no matter what his last name is. Grownups are so confusing…
It hits me now that I’ll probably never see Sally again. That makes me even sadder. Just like mom, I do everything it takes to keep the tears in my eyes. Dad notices, and like Mom always reminds me, he starts feeling guilty. He doesn’t apologize, though. He sees Mom is angry, too, so he tries to fix it the only way he knows how.
“Ladies, how about we go do some shopping, huh? Doesn’t that sound neat?”
He doesn’t get an answer, but we don’t exactly reject him, either. I need a new tutu, anyway. The old one is starting to come apart at the seams. Maybe I’ll feel better if he buys me a new tutu. And ice-cream.
1
Kira
This is it.
The day I’ve been waiting for ever since I was a little girl, trying on tutus at Columbus Circle. My mom isn’t here to see me. My dad is busy. But Madame Olenna is a decent substitute for both, as I prepare myself for the single most important ballet performance in my life.
Trinity High is notorious for its dance school, led by Madame Olenna, a former Bolshoi prima ballerina. She’s put together a minimalistic version of “The Nutcracker,” and I’m minutes away from auditioning for the part of Clara. There will be Julliard scouts attending the show. Naturally, my insides are squirming. I’m just glad I only had a cereal bar for breakfast, though even that one is threatening to come back up.
It’s my birthday tomorrow. I’d like to go into it knowing I’ve accomplished something incredible this year. The only way that’s going to happen is if I give this audition my very best. Next month it’s Christmas, too, and I can’t think of a better present than Madame Olenna telling me I got the part of Clara for a show where Julliard scouts will be present. The mere thought makes me feel closer to my dream… the very dream my mom and I used to share when I was a little girl. The very dream she won’t get to see me make true.
But I will turn it into reality. I made her that promise the day we buried her.
“Break a leg, Kira,” Giselle says, pulling me out of my thoughts. That smile on her pretty magazine cover-girl f
ace looks more like a sneer.
“That’s not what you wish a ballerina, you plum,” I reply dryly, stretching my legs on the bar. My muscles moan with delight as I reach for my toes. My hamstrings, in particular, are tingling with glee. “But good luck to you, too,” I add without so much as a glance at her.
Giselle and Lorna exchange some giggles and whispered words, and I know they’re aimed at me. But I don’t really care. They’ve spent the past five years trying to bully me into a corner, only to find themselves at a loss whenever I emerge victorious from every goddamn challenge that life and school have thrust my way.
“Look at her form,” Lorna mutters. “She’s so friggin’ stiff…”
“Meh, she might get to be a Snowflake if she bombs the audition,” Giselle says. “Madame Olenna doesn’t have the heart to cut losers from the show.”
I glance around, noticing how none of the other thirty girls and boys in our ballet class have the courage to even look at me whenever these two tarts emit half-assed opinions about me. Fucking cowards, all of them. Nevertheless, I’m sharing a stage and the practice halls with these spineless sacks of meat. The best I can do is to keep focusing on my journey… to make sure I nail the lead part so I can later flip Giselle and Lorna off.
“Giselle, perhaps you should focus on improving your Grand Jeté,” Madame Olenna’s voice cuts through the mélange of hushed voices and classical music playing in the background of our practice hall. “Petty gossip will not get you a prima ballerina position anywhere.”
Beautiful Hell: A Contemporary High School Bully Romance Page 1