When your mother boarded up the window, I had witnessed it. Thought about the times we had feasted on snow. About how afraid I was when you went out on the roof, terrified you would fall off and die, leaving me alone. Now you couldn’t get outside at all.
“Water.”
“Then get her some.”
The gap under the door was small. Even if I could find a glass of water, I wouldn’t be able to wedge it through.
“Tippy. Think. What water do you have?”
My dish. But my teeth couldn’t hold onto it well. I could not drag it through the kitchen, let alone up the stairs.
“What else could you use to carry the water?”
What would fit under the door?
Your sister had once slid a piece of paper under there, back before she left. When you were being punished, and she wasn’t allowed to speak to you. Instead she wrote a note. The paper had fit. She pushed it under the door and your mom didn’t even notice.
But paper wouldn’t hold water.
“What else, Tippy? Think harder!”
And then it hit me. Washing dishes. When you and your sister finished, you always hung the rag over the sink and it would drip for a long time, the sound driving me crazy, the constant pinging of water against metal.
But I couldn’t reach the sink.
I kissed your fingers. I was trying, Lucy, really I was.
When you scratched my cheek, you gave me another thought.
The cloth you kept at the stove. Easy access. Something that even I could reach.
I jumped up and ran down the stairs. Pulled the cloth down, soaked up all the water in my dish, hurried as best I could so as not to lose anything on my trip back to you.
When I laid it down, you didn’t move. I thought I was too late. That in the minutes I’d wasted catching as much liquid as I could, you’d left me.
Then you pulled it in. Gave me one hand to hold. Asked me for more when you pushed the rag back to me. My dish was empty, but I knew where there was an endless source nearby.
The bathroom.
It took all I had left to stretch and get it in the big bowl, but it worked. I was proud of myself. Ran back three more times, keeping my girl alive.
Later, when you were sleeping, I snuck back to my secret hiding place. Curled up for a nap, hidden so your mom wouldn’t hurt me.
When I bit into another one of my treats, my mom came back for a visit.
“You did a very good job today, Tippy. But what else does Lucy need?’
My tooth crunched the answer.
My biscuits were square and very thin. Small enough to shove under the door.
I mustered my strength. Put two in my mouth. Hurried back up to your cage.
My girl would never die.
Not while I was on the job.
Chapter 51
Lucy
In the end, I apologized to God as well.
How had I confused the two?
I’d thought I was being good. Following orders. Believing when everything Godless had said was dreadful. Wasn’t that part of the Old Testament? God says hey, go kill your son, and you do it because He gave the direction? Even after reading about his travels with Evelyn, I hadn’t questioned his origins. Just had faith, because Mom told me that he was God.
And he was the opposite.
Tippy had given me a whisper of strength. Just having her nearby was uplifting. I appreciated her efforts to keep me from starving, but it was almost too late.
In the end, I didn’t want her to see me this weak. If she could have crawled into my arms and I could have just fallen asleep, holding her, that would have been a different good-bye. As it was, I backed up as far as I could go, reaching the far wall, where I could lay on the floor and keep a watch underneath the door. If I could see Tippy, I would at least feel like I wasn’t leaving alone.
The time had come. Everything in my body told me I’d hung on too long as it was.
The worst was my mind. At times I thought I’d been having strange dreams, even nightmares, only to realize that I wasn’t asleep. Or maybe I was in some loopy world where I was asleep, dreaming that I was dreaming, and not asleep. My ideas were a labyrinth. I didn’t have the wherewithal to fight my way out of it.
Her paws were gone.
I couldn’t even hear the laughter anymore. Had he turned it off?
Birds filled the room. Not my chickens. Black birds, mammoth shadows fluffing their wings, waiting for me to go. To escort me somewhere? Had I heard that before, that animals welcome you into the next world? Or were they just hanging around because they, too, were extraordinarily hungry, and I would soon make a tasty meal?
Tippy. Why couldn’t I just hold her once more?
I spilled my last ounce of strength, sent an urgent thought to Brandy. She needed to come home. She needed to rescue my dog. Take her away from Mother. Find her a new home, if necessary. Mr. Wyckoli would love her. She needed loved.
And then it came. Sudden and unexpected. A breath-stealer.
A crisp flash of light, in the middle of the door.
Followed by a wave. My eyes shut at the sight of it, overwhelming, the light blinding me after so long spent in my room. Somehow I had expected death to be more subtle. Sleepy even. A black mist, coiling around my body while my eyes were shut and my senses on vacation.
Not this. This boisterousness. This high activity. The brightness screamed at me, not in a welcoming way, but with a pointed finger and the diaphragm of an opera singer. My bones wanted to flee. To find shelter. To desperately cling to the darkness, cower in its corners.
Instead I reached out for God. Thankful He had forgiven me.
Reached out, despite my fear, to end the pain. Begged Him, as I went, to take care of Tippy.
But I didn’t move. The floor held me captive.
I realized that she was shrieking.
Mom, tearing down the door. She was moving furiously, but it all came at me in slow motion. Like she was twirling in a big ball gown. Eyes blazing. Hair a wild bird’s nest.
Holding an ax.
Her weapon assaulted the door again. Splintered the wood. Broke it open and ushered in the hall light. It beamed directly upon me.
The craziness had finally consumed her.
But I didn’t much care. I couldn’t move. I had made my peace with God. Tippy had forgiven my weaknesses. I had nothing left.
Mom put her ax down and pulled sections of the door apart with her bare hands, until she looked like a wedding photo, the harried bride framed by the outline of the door.
I tried to smile at her. Thankful that our game was finally over. I didn’t begrudge the fact that I’d lost.
Then they returned. Their song joined me in my room seconds before I saw them. My friends, the chickens. The hall held nothing but Mother, and then suddenly they appeared.
Dozens of them, all with heads. Bigger. In a steroid rage. Clucking furiously, their beaks enormous, they were as wound up as a cellblock in the middle of a prison riot.
I smiled, because they had not forgotten me. But despite the chaos and the dance Mom was doing with her weapon, I still couldn’t move.
They attacked her. Pecked at her legs, just as they had done to Ms. Antoinette. But this was much more vicious. The birds dug into her flesh. Stabbed her with their sharp beaks, clawed at her feet with their talons.
Mom reached for the ax, swung at them. But they did not give up. Their mouths were the knives I could never find, slicing into Mom’s calves. Esther buried her face in the skin behind Mom’s kneecap, pulled away a bit of muscle, pink and flimsy like a worm. The rest soon followed her lead.
Mom gave a warrior’s cry. Brandished her blade, crushed the heads of some of my defenders. But they ripped her legs to shreds. Mom fumbled. Fell down in her big, white dress, the blood from her wounds soaking into the fabric. Red blossoms appeared at her thighs, then her torso, as the birds continued attacking.
Mom tried to crawl away. I hadn’t realized that,
in all the drama, I had inched forward for a better view. With her heading away from my room, I had a clear path to the stairs.
Could I make it?
She wailed in agony. They were pecking at her face. I turned away, not wanting to see what the chickens did to her eyeballs.
Looked back at the stairs.
At my sister, working her way up.
She had come back! She had remembered me!
But something was off. Brandy didn’t hurry to Mom’s rescue. She marched up the steps, slow and steady, moving with a swagger, as if she had all the time in the world to fix this horrible scene. Couldn’t she hear Mom screeching? See the ruckus in the hall? She was the only one among us not incapacitated, but I thought even I could hobble faster than her.
When she passed, Brandy paused and winked at me.
Her eyes were weird looking. Black. The irises almost doubled in size.
My gut woke up. Almost came leaping out of my throat, terrified of the creature standing so close to me. When I had fantasized about Brandy rescuing me, I always thought I would jump into her arms and never let go. Now I just had the urge to set myself on fire so I could escape her.
This beast was not my sister. She had grown taller, filled out and fluffed up. I had seesawed with sanity for so long that I worried for a moment that I had finally fallen off the board, but this woman was more enmity than love. The tendrils of her malice squirmed around her shoulders and patted my cheeks as she strolled past.
But nothing stunned me more than her hair. It flowed like blood from her head, rancor pulsing through every crimp and curl. Brandy wore it proud and red, just like mine. She flipped it at me when she turned her head back to Mom and her battle with the chickens.
This time our mother saw her favorite daughter. She reached up when Brandy neared her, but then her face showed shock and a profound terror.
My sister picked the ax up off the floor. Wedged her feet between the hens, scooting several aside. She wore boots and walked with the lumbering weight of a man. It didn’t faze her that the birds had pecked huge holes in Mom’s body. That blood was trickling down the hall, coating the hardwood floor.
“Guess what, Mom?” Brandy asked, calm as could be while the chickens devoured our mother. “Wrong daughter.”
The ax came down. As if Brandy had been practicing for this her entire life. I gasped in horror as Mom’s head rolled to the side and her empty eye sockets stared at me.
Somehow I was on two legs. Moving down the stairs. Propelled by terror.
But I was wobbly. Weak. Followed by a madwoman, my sister, the one I had loved so much.
“Is that any way to greet your sister?” Brandy chuckled behind me. What had happened to her while she was gone? Had it been so long and terrible that she had turned into a mother-killer? “Lucy? For real, I just saved your life.”
“The chickens—“
Shock struck full force. I made it to the living room, was desperately clinging to the back of the couch, fighting for balance. The door was not too far away. Had the snow melted? Could I get outside? How did Brandy make it here if it hadn’t?
“Came in handy. How else could I keep an eye on you?”
“What?” My lips were so dry that I could barely open my mouth.
“They make excellent cameras. Did you know that dog of yours likes to sniff your dirty underwear? How funny is that? Or Mom? She can’t pass up a Bloody Mary now and then. Good thing a little liquor puts her right to sleep. Who knows what she would do to you when she’s plastered if it didn’t? Whoops. I guess I should be using the past tense. When it comes to her, anyway.”
I inched my way toward the front door. But Brandy moved step for step with me.
“Why did you come back?” I had been content to die at the hands of Mother. She had always hated me. But Brandy?
“Oh, come on, little sister. You’re my back-up plan. Someone had to be around to take over for me in case I…failed…to take office. But in a few minutes, I’ll be crowned. No need for your services after that.”
The black birds flew down the stairs, swarmed the room. Were they a hallucination? For that matter, was Brandy?
She explained it to me in my brain. Our silent communication, which I had thought was because we were so close, such good sisters, was Brandy reading my ideas and placing her own back in my head.
Pictures of the women who shared my blood surged through my mind. The strange affliction in their eyes, like my sister’s, like mine, an image she flashed that I had never even seen in myself. Yet Brandy had it in both eyes.
Because she was Her. The one who would take over. The she-devil my family had killed each other over, trying to prevent her from rising to office.
Centuries preparing the perfect gene pool. Getting it just right. A master plan.
“I’m sorry, sweetheart. I promised to take care of you, and I did. But now it’s time for me to move on. I don’t really need you anymore.”
Because Brandy was ready to take over from the man with red hair. The one I had mistaken for God. The one who, like my sister did now, made my skin feel like it was full of flaming snakes.
Then Brandy showed me Mom. Her horrible life. How my sister, barely more than a toddler, had sat in the corner of the room while the devil took Mom and created me. Brandy lunching with the red-headed man while her grandmother watched, Mom passed out and the other woman screaming, her death imminent. She scrolled through our years together, Mom’s craziness propelled by the games Brandy played with her. Tormenting her. Keeping her cage rattled.
Keeping me in pain.
“Someone had to divert her attention away from me. You were the perfect scapegoat. She was too stupid to even consider the fact that I was Her. Talk about gullible.”
Brandy laughed, as maniacal as her father. As our father.
She raised the ax.
In that instant, three things happened. Tippy howled, the loudest and angriest cry I’d ever heard her make. For a split second, I thought that Brandy had killed my dog. I straightened, ready to fight back. Nobody fucked with Tippy. Not while my lungs still held air.
The weapon flew at me. Flinging blood off its blade.
And the windows burst.
With the shattering of glass, I heard thunder. Hooves. Dignity.
The buck jumped through the window, shards flying the length of the room, and right into my heart.
He entered me. His antlers slid through my back and out my chest, my arms raised from the force, my head swinging up so that I was eye to eye with my sister.
In an explosion of strength, we combined. Struck Brandy with our antlers, forcing her to release the ax. I dropped my head and we rammed her. Prongs straight through the gut. With so much strength that Brandy was impaled against the wall.
My sister clutched at the air. Slapped her hands against our forehead. Steam slipped between her lips, the stench of her breath like the rotten corpse of a cow festering in the smoldering sun for days on end.
The seconds flittered between us, flies darting between goodies at the picnic table, Brandy’s lungs somehow managing to pull in air despite the damage done to them.
I took my lesson from the drawings on the hallway wall. Spoke the names Tippy and I had given the headless children.
Callie. William. Fred.
The buck stepped back, but his strength remained in me.
I grabbed Mom’s weapon.
Wiped her blood away.
Went to my sister, transfixed on the wall. The deer surrounded us. I could hear their chanting, urging me to finish the job.
I remembered her loving me. Brandy, always my mother. My best friend.
“I love you.”
Tippy barked. She would never lead me astray. I thought of the times I’d not tried to escape, to get both of us to safety. How she’d smuggled me food. I would never do wrong by her again.
I swung the weapon. Watched the deer back off after we were all sprayed with blood.
Brandy’s eyes s
pread wide. Her mouth opened; she wailed and put Ms. Antoinette to shame. Was she calling for her father? Our father? Would he come to challenge me once he knew his replacement was dead?
The ax felt comfortable in my hand. No wonder I had never found a knife. I wouldn’t have known how to use it properly. But this handle fit perfectly in my grip, came up over my shoulder with the ease of a feather pillow, and landed time and time again on my sister’s face.
She was nothing when I finished. Not human. Not monster. Just a spray of blood, up the walls and across the ceiling, a clump of tissue that would never scream again.
I was horrified at my actions. When I realized what I had done, I dropped the ax and backed away from her body. Felt the vigor of the buck’s body leave my own. Watched as my sister’s blood dripped from my hair and over the carpet.
When I collapsed, the buck caught me. Let me lean against him. Lowered himself to the floor where I could be safe.
Tippy curled into my arms. We stared at my sister’s body, the blood-soaked wad of flesh that had once been her beautiful face, knowing what this meant. What she had explained, just moments before.
I was her backup.
The next in line.
I watched as the birds moved one by one toward her corpse. They were much larger than I first noticed. They ripped into her flesh. Devoured the sister I loved, leaving nothing in their wake.
Had she sent them here to take care of me?
Tippy touched noses with the deer. One by one, she spoke to all of them. The buck bent down and snorted next to my ear. I ran my hand over his muzzle. Thanked him. He had jumped inside my body, joined us. His courage and power. Life savers.
The others had been my friends, as well. Why had I ever worried that I was alone in the world, when my life was full of these magnificent animals?
I wanted to run off with them, but did not know where my new role should take me. From what Brandy had shown me, at midnight I would take over the dark side of the world. I would be Her, the one no one dared call by name. Would Tippy fear me then?
What would I ever do? I couldn’t live like Evelyn. Didn’t want to be heartless like my big sister. If they hadn’t been trying so hard to kill me, I would never have hurt anyone in my family.
The Eye Unseen Page 26
