Hysteria

by Megan Miranda

This was a girl. I worried it was another attempt at initiation—worried that I’d get dragged out of my room and abandoned on some roof while half unconscious.

  “Please,” she cried again, and then she gulped back a sob—real fear, hard to fake.

  I swung my legs out of bed, and my head felt funny from the sleeping pill—too full, too slow—but there was another cry on the other side of the door, and I had to get there. Step, I instructed my leg. Move. Again. And again. But everything was so painstakingly slow. I unlocked the door, and the handle quickly turned from the other side. And then Bree was in my room, gripping on to my arms, leaning into me. Her eyes were wild.

  I stumbled back, into my desk. “Help me,” she whispered.

  I nodded, because that’s really all I was capable of doing. And even that was a stretch. I was still fading, fading—fighting it, but fading still.

  “Can I stay?” she asked. She was looking at her empty bed. Like she meant longer than just that moment. Like she meant indefinitely.

  I opened my mouth to say no, but the room felt different with her in it. I imagined her steady breathing across the room at night, and her clothes hanging in the closet, and everything felt crowded, but in a good way. Like sleeping bags lined up next to each other at a slumber party.

  Bree looked over her shoulder at the open door. She ran and pushed it closed. “She’s coming,” she said. Or maybe it was he’s coming, but she had whispered, and now the words were gone.

  I tried to force my mouth to form the word, Who? But I had nothing. All I knew was that she was terrified. So terrified that she came to me, like I was the lesser of two evils. Or maybe because she knew I could help her.

  And I could.

  I fell to my knees, which was the easiest thing I’d done so far. And I pulled open the bottom drawer of the desk. I felt my breath slowing, slowing, even though it should’ve been speeding up from the adrenaline. Look, I willed her.

  And she did. She looked down, and she looked at me, and I saw her throat move as she swallowed. Then she looked at the door again. Back to me. The door. And I heard her name, sounding far, far away.

  Take the . . . I started to think.

  And I was gone.

  Kind of.

  But I had this hazy vision of a shadow looking down at me, head cocked to the side. And I heard voices. Whispers. Like static moving through my brain.

  I woke up to my alarm. In my bed. I shook my head, trying to judge what was real and what wasn’t. The room looked untouched. I was on my back, sheets pulled up to my neck. I turned off the alarm and tested the door. Locked.

  I took a deep breath. A dream. Just a dream.

  I got my shower caddy together and grabbed my bathrobe. And then, just to be sure, I pulled open the bottom drawer to my desk.

  The knife was gone.

  CHAPTER 13

  Somebody took my knife. Not exactly something I could report. I pulled the brush through my hair, tearing at the knots. Tearing even after there were no knots left. Last night had happened. It had really happened. And something else had happened, between the time I opened the desk drawer and made it to my bed. But I couldn’t remember.

  I closed my eyes and ran through the events again and again: the knocking, Bree, the knife. I dropped the brush. Oh God, Bree. Had she taken it? Had she used it?

  I ran out into the hall, toward her room. Bree was there. In the hall. Walking from the bathroom, in her robe, toward her room. Taryn moved in the opposite direction with a shower caddy in her hand. Neither looked up at me, though they must’ve noticed me, standing, staring, in the middle of the hall.

  It happened and the knife was gone and Bree was fine. But now she wouldn’t look at me.

  A new feeling settled in my stomach. Fear. She must’ve reported me. Ran to Ms. Perkins, showing her the knife. Maybe the campus police were on their way. Or Dad, with his disapproving look, or Mom, with no look, really, at all. On their way to retrieve me because I wasn’t welcome here any longer.

  Except no one came. I got ready for class, like normal, and everyone acted like they normally acted around me now. Which was to say, they either looked too much or not at all.

  But every time someone came to the classroom door, my heart leapt into my throat. Every time someone uttered a name that started with the letter M, I jumped. But the next few classes passed without incident.

  At lunch, I saw Ms. Perkins in the quad. She glanced my way, just for a second, and then kept talking to the teacher next to her. I let out a long breath.

  Nobody told.

  But the knife was still gone.

  I sat under the giant oak by myself. The ground was a little on the damp side, but the dirt up around the roots was dry. Added bonus: nobody else was out here.

  Except Reid. Walking toward me, his hands deep in his pockets.

  Reid skipped class. He had to, that was the only way he’d find me on my lunch period. “Mallory,” he called as I gathered up my half-eaten lunch. I didn’t have time to pack it all up and escape before he got here.

  He looked at my shoulder first. Just a quick look, but I noticed, and I felt the scabs itching underneath the bandage.

  Then he sat down beside me. “I’m sorry,” he said, which I hated. But then he said, “I’m sorry you’re upset. But I’m not sorry that I did it,” which I loved. “And I’m sorry the words came out wrong . . .”

  “Stop apologizing,” I said.

  “I like you.” The air felt too warm suddenly. Because I realized that Brian had never said those words. So ridiculous. He’d said a lot of other things, which I’d thought amounted to the same thing.

  But they didn’t.

  Reid kept talking. “I like you, but . . .” Ah, the famous I like you, but . . . “Does it have to be this hard?”

  Everything’s this hard. “If this is you breaking up with me, save it. You have to be together before you can break up.”

  “That’s not what I’m saying. I’m saying . . . let’s start over. Go back. I’m the guy you used to see three times a year and now we’re here at school together. Let’s go back.”

  Go back. A do-over. Like this was all a game. Like what you do doesn’t count unless you want it to.

  “Say yes,” he said.

  Reid of all people should know you can’t go back. Can’t start over. Can’t call redo and play a better hand. But here he was, pretending we could. If you pretend something hard enough, could it become real?

  I shifted so I was facing him, raised myself up on my knees. He pulled me closer, his arms around my back, and I rested my forehead against his chest. My hands gripped his shirt, like I was begging for something. Like I was kneeling at some altar. Like this whole thing was some kind of prayer.

  That night, there was a shadow under my door. Just standing there. Waiting. Every few seconds it shifted a little. Then it went away. And then it came back. It was after lights out, but I hadn’t taken the sleeping pill yet. I slowly eased the top drawer of my desk open and slid the scissors into the waistband of my pajama pants. And then I walked very cautiously, so I wouldn’t cut myself.

  I cracked the door, and as my eyes adjusted to the light, I saw Bree, with her eyes wide, like she’d been caught in my headlights. “What is it?” I asked.

  “Sorry. I was about to knock.”

  “Um, about last night,” I said.

  “Oh God, I’m mortified,” Bree said, throwing her hands into the air. Then she smiled, looking past me. “I mean, seriously. You must’ve thought I was crazy.”

  “I thought you were scared. But I’d taken a sleeping pill. And . . .”

  “Right. You told me.”

  “What were you running from?”

  “Oh. Nothing, really. It’s just, I can’t sleep. And Taryn snores. I know you wouldn’t guess it by looking at her, but she does. And I’m having, like, nightmares or something. Except without really sleeping. Weird, huh?”

  “Weird,” I said. “So about the, uh . . .”

  But
Bree just stared at me, her head cocked to the side. Like she wasn’t about to acknowledge what she and I both knew I’d showed her. “About the what?”

  “The sleeping pill. I don’t know if I said something, maybe? Or did something? I wasn’t really thinking straight.”

  Bree was looking over my shoulder, into the room, and I realized I was holding my breath. And then I realized why. I was hoping she’d ask to move back in. Pathetic.

  “Well, that’s kind of why I’m here,” Bree said, still looking into the room. “I was wondering if you could spare one.”

  I tried to look into her eyes, but she looked unfocused. Tired, I guessed. Was this the start of friendship? Or the restart? Maybe like Reid said, we could have do-overs. I didn’t know. But I also didn’t know what harm a single sleeping pill could do. So I went to the drawer and pulled out the vial, and all the while Bree stayed in the door frame, with her eyes too wide, watching.

  She held out her palm, and I could see her veins running through it. I could see this faint tremor, too, like I saw under the window the other day. She really did need sleep. She needed my help. I tapped the lip of the vial on her open palm, and a single pill settled into the crease of her hand.

  She closed her fist around it. “Okay,” she whispered, backing away.

  “Okay,” I said, and I watched her walk down the hall like in a trance, absently fumbling with her doorknob, her fist still closed around that single pill. Like it was worth something.

  Then I took one myself. And right after, I heard something outside my window. Someone was there. I was sure of it. Almost sure of it. I heard the resistance of the lock as it was pushed upward. I turned on the lights and threw open the shades, but I could only see my reflection. I darted across the room and turned off the lights—and I swear I saw a dark figure heading for the trees.

  Long, lanky strides. Hair lit in the moonlight. Brian.

  Hysteria, I thought. In my mind. Hallucinations. So I jerked the blinds closed and lay on the bed and took comfort in the familiarity of what would happen next.

  The beating of his heart. My name, whispered. Begging me to wait. And his hand.

  I let it come, and I felt some relief, finally. Like this was the consequence. And all I had to do was endure it.

  The next day was full of a different kind of talk. Reid and Krista. Fighting.

  “He called her a manipulative bitch,” some girl whispered in math. Lisa? Lissa?

  “No, he said she was a pathetic, manipulative bitch,” the girl next to her said.

  “Was that before or after she kissed him?”

  My head slipped off my hand and nearly banged into the table. The girls looked at me, and they didn’t look away, or stare too long, or anything. The one closest to me leaned over and grinned. She whispered, “Before she tried to kiss him.”

  I smiled quickly at her, and ran the image through my mind. Krista cornering him. Trying to kiss him. Reid pushing her back, calling her a manipulative bitch. No, a pathetic, manipulative bitch. Perfect. And then I thought of these two girls, and I thought that maybe there were a lot of people like that—normal, non-bitchy, non-crazy people, like Chloe—and I just hadn’t looked hard enough yet. I also thought I should probably start looking.

  Reid found me after class—before his game. He was out of breath, and probably running late for warm-ups. “So,” he said, “I should probably tell you that I got in a fight with Krista.”

  “So I heard,” I said.

  “Not, like, a physical one or anything.”

  “I know.”

  “She tried to kiss me,” he said.

  “I heard that too. Funny. I thought she didn’t like you.”

  “She doesn’t,” he said.

  “I don’t get it.”

  “She was trying to mess with me. And you.”

  “Why does she hate us?”

  “It’s not us, don’t you see? It’s not even her. But I’m so freaking sick of it.” He closed his eyes and shook his head, then refocused on me. “Oh, but in the interest of full disclosure, I should also tell you that Saturday is in two days.”

  “Good math, Reid.”

  “Thanks. Yeah. No school. No practice. I’m free. Available. You know, if you’re going to be around . . .”

  “Good to know,” I said, and I couldn’t stop the stupid smile from spreading across my face.

  “But now I gotta go kick some soccer ass. See you soon?”

  “See you soon,” I promised.

  And suddenly the next two days couldn’t be over fast enough. I watched him race off to get ready for his game, and I sat under the giant oak, just staring off into the distance. Watching while the sky turned different shades of blue as the clouds moved across the sun. Like Colleen and I used to do on the summer evenings from the boardwalk.

  I went back to my dorm to send her an e-mail. But as I walked through the lounge, I saw Krista sitting with Taryn and Bree, and I caught the end of Krista’s sentence. “He won’t get away with it,” she said, bringing her fist down on the coffee table like a gavel.

  I grinned, thinking how inconsequential they were. How Reid didn’t give a crap what they said about him. How Reid was bigger than all this. And then they all followed me with their eyes as I walked across the room. Except for Bree. Bree didn’t look up. Like we were arguing about something.

  The afternoon of the party, after I argued with Colleen, after I left her in the water for Brian, and then after he had left me, I got a text from her. A peace offering, I guess: I’m still grounded. But you should go.

  I wrote back: Lame without you anyway.

  And she wrote: My life would be complete if you had a Y chromosome.

  So when she showed up that night, catching fireflies on my back patio, I knew she was doing it for me. Not for her. Not for Cody Parker. Me.

  I left the girls in the lounge, and I sent Colleen an e-mail. There might be stuff to tell you, I wrote, which I knew she’d interpret as boy stuff. But I felt like I was lying to her, by all the things I wasn’t saying. Reid’s name. The blood on my shoulder, the fingerprints on my skin, the knife I stole and lost, or possibly just misplaced in my psychosis. The things I saw that were not there. She sent an e-mail right back saying she’d be ungrounded Saturday.

  For the first time in a long time, I was looking forward instead of backward. To what comes next.

  Two more days.

  CHAPTER 14

  That night, like always, it started with the heartbeat. Boom, boom, boom.

  And then my name. Mallory. Wait.

  And then the hand. The fingers, digging in, grinding down through muscle and nerve. Shocks of pain radiating down my arm.

  But then, there was a different dream.

  First I saw Brian’s mouth, saying, “Mallory, wait.” Like always. And then Brian’s mother appeared, reaching a hand out to me, garbage hanging from her clothes, asking me to wait. Then I was leaning in to kiss Reid, but his hands were on my shoulders, pushing me back, and he was saying, “Wait.” And then Colleen was curled up behind me on the sand, whispering, “Wait,” into my ear. And then I was walking into the fog, wandering away from campus, down that path past the cross, and a boy was running in front of me, getting farther and farther away, and I was the one chasing after him. I was the one screaming, “Wait!”

  Click.

  My door. Was it in my dream? Or was it from that place where things that did not exist whispered in my ear? It felt real as anything.

  I jumped out of bed and my head swam like my blood was running in the wrong direction. I dove for the door, but it was locked.

  Maybe it was the closet.

  I took my scissors out and held them in front of me as I flung open the closet door, but nothing moved except the clothes, the hangers squeaking with the faintest motion.

  I checked the window. This time I kept the light off. I pulled the shade up and placed my hands against the glass, peering out. The moon was bright, and the trees looked like tall shadow
s. Nothing moved.

  Then I stepped back and saw a mark against the glass. A handprint. I flipped the lights on and saw that it was red, like blood. I went closer to inspect the handprint, hoping it was something other than blood. But it wasn’t.

  And it was on the inside.

  It was mine.

  The moon had been bright that night, even though it was raining. And I was running, sprinting, wheezing with each step. The alley moving by me in a blur. Feet on the wooden boardwalk. The moon was too bright. I was too bright. Over the dunes. Down on the sand at high tide. The white light reflected off the water, reflected off me. There was so much blood.

  Too much blood. I didn’t understand how there could possibly be that much blood on my hands, on my arms, on my chest. How did it get there? How did it get everywhere?

  I raced toward the pier, where the boardwalk juts out. To the darkness. And I fell onto my knees in the water and dug my hands deep under the sand, trying to scrub it all off. I fell face-first, and I picked up fistfuls of sand and ground it into the front of my shirt. Over my arms. Everywhere.

  The salt water stung my eyes. And it stung my arms, where the blood was my own. And then I sat back, while the water and Brian’s blood lapped around me, and I waited. I waited. I waited.

  In the light of my room, my hands came into focus. The right one was clean. The left was coated red. I wiped it on my pants, but the red had settled into the lines of my palm. There were no cuts. The blood was dripping from my shoulder, down my arm, to my hand. Blood fell from my middle finger onto the floor.

  I balled up a shirt and wiped up the blood. Then I pressed it to my shoulder. I was scared to look, but I had to. The whole handprint was raw—blistered—like it had been faintly seared into my shoulder. And the blister where the pinky finger left a mark was weeping blood.

  It was nearly dawn. I ran to the bathroom and dabbed at my shoulder, hissing with pain. I rinsed all the blood off before anyone woke up, and rebandaged it gently. I pressed my hand down on top of it, like I might somehow hold in all the blood, or make it clot or something.