In Nightmares We're Alone (7 page)

“All right.” She pauses a second. “Hey. Buster was locked in the doll room, you had a boy over, but I got home first so you dodged a bullet. Can you do me a favor? Don’t start any shit today and maybe we’ll have a night Mom doesn’t yell at either of us?”

“Maybe,” I say, and I head back to my room.

Sissy chuckles and shakes her head. “Maybe,” she says. “You’re definitely my sister.”

For the rest of the day it almost seems like everything is cured all of a sudden. Beth never talks to me the rest of the night. Mommy doesn’t even say anything more to me about what happened at school because she says a really nice man asked her out on a date tomorrow afternoon and she’s excited about that.

Sissy wants to know all about the man, but I don’t really care. My only interest in Mommy having a boyfriend is maybe she’ll get like Martin’s mommy and only care about spending time with him, and then maybe she won’t care so much about a stupid doll that she won’t get rid of it when she promised she would. I cross my fingers for that. I make myself excited for Mommy’s date.

By bedtime I actually find myself thinking it was kind of a fun adventure having Martin with me for the day. Maybe he’s my good luck charm. Ever since he came over, there’s a feeling like everything might just work out.

When I wake up the next morning the first thing I do is look at the bookshelf in my room and Kaylie’s not on it. Nowhere to be seen, weird eyes or otherwise. I didn’t wake up in the night, there were no whispers, and now there are no dolls in places they’re not supposed to be. I jump out of bed smiling to get ready for school.

As if I didn’t have enough luck on my side, Mrs. Harris is absent today and the substitute is Mrs. Coughlin, who is everybody’s favorite. Last Friday when Mrs. Harris left school early Mrs. Coughlin came in and taught us how to make bracelets with beads and string. After the abuse I took from Mrs. Harris yesterday in the janitor’s closet, this is the best present I could ask for, and I didn’t even have to ask. I don’t raise my hand for Show and Tell and I don’t even mind the way all the other kids look at me like they expect me to start a scene. I just feel good.

At recess I’m quietly trying to avoid Martin because I’m afraid he’ll only complain to me that I never took my clothes off, but he still manages to find me.

“Hey,” he says, “I know a way we can make money.”

“What? Why do we need money.”

“You don’t like money?”

“I guess I do. I just…”

“I know a good trick. A way to make people put down their wallets where it’s easy for you to take off with them. I’m not gonna tell you, but I’ll show you if you want. I need a partner in crime.”

All of this makes me uncomfortable. I’m starting to wonder if Martin isn’t such a good boy.

“I don’t want to think about it,” I say. “I just want to worry about the doll. Maybe after the doll is gone we can think about making money.”

Martin rolls his eyes. “You and that doll. Hang on. I’m gonna take a piss.”

He heads into the boys’ room and I sit by myself on the curb and start tracing lines in the pavement. It’s then that I hear those girls jumping rope again.

Good little dolly,

Eyes of red.

How many days

Till Macie’s dead?

One…

Two…

Three…

“Hey!” I say, standing up. There’s a burst of rage in me stronger than it should be. I can’t explain why I’m so affected but I can’t even control myself. “Hey!”

“Oh crap,” says one of them, laughing. “It’s witch-girl.”

“How about you quit being a bunch of stupid cunts?”

All the giggling stops, the jumping rope, the smart comebacks. All the girls playing hopscotch and the boys playing tetherball. All eyes go to me and everybody stands still. All three of the girls with their jump rope stand there with their mouths open.

Way out by the playground there are monitors looking at me, some of the parents who volunteer at the school to make sure none of the kids behave like me. I can see a couple of girls running to the monitors and pointing at me and telling what they just heard.

“We didn’t mean any—” one girl starts, looking fragile, but the oldest girl steps toward me and cuts her off.

“I’m gonna tell what you called us.”

Her eyes glow. One blue, one green.

I make a fist and slam it into her nose and I feel it crack to one side and she goes down screaming. The other two girls jump back a few steps and gasp.

Now the monitors start running toward us.

The older girl is wailing. She’s sitting on the blacktop with one hand on the ground supporting her and the other over her nose and mouth and blood is already starting to drip from under her hand.

The monitors get closer.

I point a finger at the other two girls and say, “You better start being nicer.”

The monitors grab me by each arm before the girls can respond. They start asking “What is the
matter
with you?” and “Why would you
do
that?” They say I’m a
bad girl
, the way you say it when a dog does her business on the carpet.

I get it. I’m the bad dog.

Martin comes out of the bathroom just as one of the monitors tries to pick me up and I say, “I can walk,” in a really bitter voice. She grabs my arm and leads me away. Martin tries to ask what happened and the monitor tells him never mind. He looks really disappointed that he missed it.

Two other monitors kneel next to the older girl saying “Are you okay?” and “Let me see how bad it is,” and “What happened?”

The really angry monitor who’s escorting me keeps telling me to keep walking, she tells me they’re going to call my parents and maybe the police. I keep my eyes locked with the other girls’ until we turn the corner and we’re out of sight.

The grown ups can live in their world where I’m the bad dog, but in my world I’m done being someone you can fuck with.

* * * * *

It’s the same charade from Mr. V and he’s as sick of it as I am. Now I play it the way he wants it played. I don’t try to explain myself or make him understand. I just be the bad dog.

He asks, “What makes you think it’s okay to hurt another student like that?”

I say, “She was being a little bitch.”

He says, “I’ll thank you not to use words like that at school, Miss Giddings.”

I say, “You asked, chief.”

He says, “What is your mother going to think when I tell her you sent another student to the hospital?”

I say, “She doesn’t think much of anything I do anymore.”

He says, “I don’t blame her.”

I say, “Shit happens.”

They get on the phone with Mommy and tell her they’re sorry to say I’m in trouble again and it’s worse than it has been, I broke a girl’s nose and she’s been taken to the hospital. They tell her I refuse to explain myself and I really need a lesson in how to keep my vocabulary in check when I’m on school grounds and without even hearing her voice I know Mommy’s just sighing and saying “I know” and “I’m sorry” and “I just wish I knew what to do.” Principal V asks if she’s considered boarding school and says he’s seen it work wonders for other students before. He tells her he won’t sugarcoat it for her, I’m on thin ice and I’ll be in detention for the rest of the month and if this behavior keeps up it won’t be long before I’m suspended or expelled and if the other girl’s parents decide to press charges I could be put in a juvenile detention center and he thinks it might not be such a bad idea because it might teach me a little responsibility and all that crap.

Bad dogs get crated.

Mommy’s just me, me, me when she asks to talk to me on the phone. She tells me, “I was right in the middle of a lunch date, Macie. I told you yesterday how excited I was about it. Is that what this is about? Are you
trying
to make my life harder?”

No. No, I’m not. Was buying Beth all about trying to make mine harder?

Honestly, I feel bad for Mommy. I know it’s hard for her. But if she’d just get rid of the doll like she said she would, or if she’d just listen to me and believe me like a mommy is supposed to, maybe everything would be okay. If
any
of the grown ups would listen, maybe everything would be okay. But none of them care. They don’t want to fix my problem. They just want to fix their problem and their problem is me. They think if they be mean to me I’ll shut up, but I’m not shutting up until they help me, and they’ve shown me over and over that they’re not interested in that.

I sit in the office the rest of the day being the bad dog. I don’t talk much, I don’t apologize, I don’t act ashamed. I just let them think whatever they’re going to think.

* * * * *

Mommy asks if I want to talk about it and I say no. She lectures me some more and I keep quiet and she says she’s seriously considering boarding school and what do I think about that and I say whatever, sure, let’s do it. Hell, why not? Girls in boarding schools don’t usually collect vintage dolls with heterochromia, do they? I fucking doubt it.

I go to bed without supper about the time Buster gets fed because he’s the good dog and I’m the bad dog and I don’t really care. I’m plenty fed up already. I don’t need supper.

For some reason I wake up after an hour of sleep and it’s more muscle memory than fear when I check to see if Kaylie’s sitting there looking at me. She isn’t. Maybe she’s finally gone for good.

Not that it matters. The door is cracked anyway and I don’t feel so tired, so I get out of bed and head for the doll room. I don’t even have to get a knife to pick the lock because Beth’s left it halfway open for me like a good new Mommy.

I come in and shut the door and turn on the light and say, “Hello, Beth.”

Call me Mommy.

“You don’t deserve it. You treat me worse than any of the grown ups.”

You’re not a very obedient daughter yourself.

“What do you want, Beth? Why won’t you just leave me alone and let me do my schoolwork and live in my house with my family and stop interfering?”

It’s my family too.

It’s weird how accustomed I’ve become to all of this. Here’s this doll with human eyes staring at me from the dresser and talking to me in an old woman’s voice that’s only in my head and I’m standing here having the conversation without shivering or sweating or anything.

“I don’t like you. Sissy doesn’t give you any thought at all. Mommy is the only one who likes you and you just cause problems for her anyway.”

You’ve caused her problems. The bad daughter. I’ve done no such thing.

“You
made
me do it.”

Stop talking like that, Macie. You’re a big girl. Act like it.

“Stop. You’re not my mother. I don’t need a new one. You’re worse than the one I’ve got.”

I’ll be a good mother to you. You’ll see.

“Can we have a truce? If I stop trying to burn you do you promise to stop taunting me?”

Taunting you?

“Waking me up at night and turning everything’s eyes like yours and saying you’re going to be my mother.”

I
am
going to be your mother.

“Why can’t we just stop fighting and all live together and be happy? Why does it have to be so bad?”

I’m sorry, sweetie. It’ll be better. When I’m your Mommy we’ll be happy. We just have to do away with your bad Mommy.

Something twists in my stomach. “I won’t let you hurt her. You’ve hurt us too much already. You won’t get away with it.”

Tomorrow night. Tomorrow night when she comes home. That’s when we’ll fix everything. It’ll be all better after that.

“Why, Beth?” I’m more sad than scared. “Why?”

Because you’re not healthy, sweetheart. You’re not happy.

My voice cracks and a tear rolls down my cheek as I say, “But it’s because of
you
that I’m not.”

Aww. Go back to bed, honey. We’ll get this all sorted out tomorrow. There’ll be plenty of time to talk about it when your bad Mommy is out of the picture.

When I step out of the room I hear Mommy sitting on the porch out back and talking. I want to run to her and tell her about the doll’s threat. I want to tell her that we need to burn Beth now to save her, but she won’t believe me. She’ll just groan for the hundredth time and put me in bed and tell me not to come out again.

“I’m sorry, I just I can’t do dinner. Not tomorrow,” she’s saying into the phone out there on the other side of the sliding glass door. “You’re a really nice guy but my life is just so hectic now I’m not sure it’s a good idea. I need to sort out my daughter’s behavior problems before I can think about serious dating.”

Sort out my problems? There’s a fireplace here in the living room that can sort them out in five minutes.

But as soon as I hear Mommy say it, I know I still have a chance tomorrow. I run out through the sliding glass door and hug Mommy’s legs as she’s sitting in her chair.

“Macie,” she says, covering the phone, “What are you doing out of bed? It’s late.”

“I don’t want you to cancel your date for me,” I say to her. “I’m sorry I got mad at those girls, but I want you to be happy. I’ll behave tomorrow, I promise. You can go.”

“Casey, I’ll call you back in five minutes,” she says into the phone.

She takes me back to bed and tucks me in and I keep saying nice things to her to make her do what I want. Before she leaves my room I make her tell me she’s going to call that guy back and tell him it’s okay if they have dinner tomorrow.

You’re not the only one who can manipulate people, Beth. I’m not going to play this like a good girl anymore.

I don’t sleep the rest of the night. I’m too busy crying. Crying and planning.

Twenty minutes before I should be getting up for school there’s a soft knock at my door and Sissy comes in. She shuts the door behind her and comes over to my bed with a smile that’s a tad wicked.

“What’s up, goon?” she says.

“Nothing. I don’t know.”

“Mom’s got her big date tonight and she asked me to babysit. She’s not going to be home till pretty late. You remember what I said about collateral?”