Page 99 of Dark Ugly Places

I catch the corner of Janice’s face, smirking. My mother places her hand on the casket and starts to cry heavy, strange sobs that almost sound like laughter. Someone hands her a handkerchief with little yellow tulips embroidered on the bottom. She blots her makeup and dabs at her eyes. Janice hugs her waist and buries her face in her stomach. “It’s okay, Mommy,” she says. “You still have me.”

Later, the guests have left, and the house is full of containers of food that make me sick to look at. I have long since retreated to my bedroom. My mother comes in and sits at the edge of my bed, careful not to get too close to me. A hand on my back, firm, unfeeling. “You didn’t cry.”

I sit up, aware that she expects me to answer. “I don’t feel sad.”

My mother is quiet. She turns away, shakes her head. “You’re in shock. That’s all. I’ll make an appointment with the psychiatrist. I think it would be good for you to talk to somebody.”

“I don’t,” I tell her. “I feel fine.”

“You are not fine, Nicola.”

I reach for a magazine under my bed. This one has the latest celebrity boy crush on the cover—blond hair, sweet blue eyes, a jaunty expression like he’s just shown up at your birthday party to sing a song for you. My bedding wafts faint odors of grease and dust into the air as I flip onto my stomach. “Cut me some slack, why don’t you?”

My mother’s eyes flare. “You watch the way you talk to me, young lady.”

I pull away from her as she reaches for my arm. Her nails dig into my flesh. I look at my arm, then up at her.

“You know, it wasn’t just you. I was afraid of him, too.”

I sit quietly, watching her recall her particular shades of pain. “I didn’t show it to you, but he used to hurt me as well.”

“Well, at least you were a grown-up when it happened.”

I watch her face stiffen, her eyes narrow.

“You could have done something. Daddy needed help.”

She stands up, and I realize she’s now wearing the same slippers and blue robe that belonged to my father. The smell of grease was him, not my bed. She pulls her robe around her, releasing another waft of him. I feel sick to my stomach. “What exactly could I have done?”

“I don’t know, get Daddy a doctor? Medication? Anything!”

“Your father didn’t want to get help. I could hardly force him, could I?”

I’m quiet, but my heart is lurching in my chest, banging forward on the walls of my sternum. “Well, maybe you should have.”

My mother leans toward me, her dark eyes cold, vacant. Her lips pull back, like an animal snarling, ready to bite. I brace myself for the sting of her words.

“You little ingrate,” she whispers. “One day, I hope you live this.” Her arms spread wide as her voice envelops me, a low and deadly frequency. “I hope you feel exactly what this is like.”

One day.

One day.

That day came and went.

Then Martha arrived.

Or was she always there?

My mother’s body stiffens unnaturally. A crack forms straight down her middle, the center dark and thick. Her mouth gapes open and hangs, blackness emanating.

The walls of my bedroom turn charcoal gray, cinders in a pit of fire. A million cracks and crevices climb the walls, and ashes spill out as the room crumbles into dust around me. The light dims and goes out, leaving nothing but the cold and bitter emptiness of the place I am in. It extends forever and ever, this great void. I reach into it, clutching at the vacancy, hoping that this is the final memory, and now that Daddy is gone, I’ll have a chance to escape, to return to Emmy and put Martha back where she belongs.

Back with the darkness.

Back with the memories.

Back with him.