The Merciless

by Danielle Vega

  “It’s just a stupid sketch.” I lick one finger and try to rub it away, but I just smear the ink and blood into my skin. Riley shifts her eyes back to my face, her lips lifting at the corners. The effect isn’t the same as it was behind the bleachers, when her smile made her face warmer. This smile doesn’t reach Riley’s eyes at all. They stay empty.

  “Of course,” she says.

  CHAPTER TWO

  My classmates linger by the school doors after the last bell, waiting for rides from parents. You could walk down every street in Friend in an hour flat, but everyone still drives shiny black SUVs that leak air-conditioning and pop music from their open windows.

  I see a flash of white out of the corner of my eye and turn in time to watch Alexis and Riley climb into a car. Grace waves at them from the sidewalk, surrounded by a circle of boys wearing sports jerseys and girls with shampoo-commercial hair. No matter the school, no matter the city, the popular group is always made of the same mix of athletes and the unfairly beautiful. Everything in their lives is just a little shinier, richer—better. Of course I’d want that. Anyone would.

  I slip past pockets of kids giggling and talking and start to walk home. I live so close that I can see my neighborhood from the school parking lot. The land here is all flat and dry, and the summers are so hot that I’m already sweating. It’s the end of September and I’m still waiting for the last of the ninety-degree days to cool into autumn.

  My neighborhood’s entrance is marked by a four-foot-tall sign with the words HILL HOLLOW HOMES written in scrolling white letters. There’s a fake waterfall and pond, though both are dry now, with weeds and dandelions growing through cracks in the sun-bleached rocks. Past that, the subdivision is a ghost town. The few dozen houses scattered across acres of bulldozed land are mostly empty.

  I stare at the toes of my sneakers as I walk past three vacant lots and two identical houses, each with the same blue siding, white porch, and red front door as mine. Whoever chose the color scheme for our neighborhood was very patriotic.

  Our place is the lone house on its block. It’s a split-level with a narrow porch, a bay window, and a backyard that stretches for half an acre before the grass gives way to dirt and open land. The shed at the top of the driveway looks like a miniature version of the house itself, matching in color and style. Aside from the Uncle Sam paint job, it looks like every other house I’ve ever lived in.

  I climb the rickety wooden steps to the door and let myself in, slipping on a brochure someone wedged under the front door. It’s another advertisement for the Baptist church down the street. We’ve gotten two or three every day since we moved in. Mom hates the brochures so much she actually called the church to complain. She’s always been a little touchy about religion. She never told me the whole story, just that Grandmother didn’t take her getting pregnant out of wedlock very well.

  I’m not a fan of anything that says I’m a mistake, either, but sometimes I wish she hadn’t cut religion out of our lives so completely. Grandmother got over the unmarried thing by the time I was born, and I’ve always thought her dedication to Catholicism was beautiful. I stare down at the creepy bleeding heart on the front of the brochure. I should save them and make a collage of bleeding hearts for my wall. Mom would love that.

  I drop my backpack on the kitchen table and grab a glass from the perfectly organized cupboard above the sink. We’ve only lived here a couple weeks, but almost all the boxes are already unpacked, our things carefully stored in cabinets and drawers. Sergeant Nina Flores handles everything with military precision.

  I fill the glass with water and carry it to my grandmother’s room down the hall. I knock softly before easing her door open.

  “Hola, Abuela,” I greet her as I push her door closed with my elbow, blinking in the dark. Light hurts Grandmother’s eyes, so we hung heavy curtains over the windows to block the sun and draped a scarf over her floor lamp to keep her room dim. The scarf turns the room red, and it takes a moment for my eyes to adjust.

  I carefully make my way over to her bedside table and dig out the plastic container of her pills. Grandmother is sitting upright in bed, rosary beads clutched in her shaking hands. She stares ahead, lips moving wordlessly as she pushes the beads through her fingers.

  She used to be beautiful, but it’s hard to see that now. A few years ago, a stroke ruined the muscles on the right side of her body. Skin hangs from the bones in her face like melting wax, and her cheek droops so low that I can see the foggy white bottom half of her eye and the blood-red part inside her eyelid. The right side of her mouth is frozen in a twisted frown that doesn’t match up with the smiling, laughing grandmother I remember.

  I force myself to slip the pills past her cracked lips, then lift the water glass so she can take a drink. She’s still the grandmother who sent me funny little poems written in Spanish on my birthday, I remind myself.

  Water dribbles out of the right side of her mouth. I wipe it away with my sleeve, then squeeze her papery, soft hand. Her raspy breath interrupts the silence in the room, followed by the click click of the wooden rosary beads against the table attached to her hospital bed. She hasn’t spoken a word since the stroke.

  “Okay, exercise time,” I say, setting the water glass down on her bedside table. I move her blanket and carefully stretch her right leg, then ease it upward to bend her knee so her muscles don’t atrophy. I do this three times, just like her last nurse showed me. We haven’t been able to find a nurse for her in Friend yet.

  “You would love it here, you know,” I say, putting her leg down. I slide the blanket back over it and move to the other leg. “They sell statues of the Virgin at the gas station.”

  Grandmother’s rosary beads click against the table, like the second hand on a clock. She never really notices when I do her exercises. I’m not sure she can feel her legs anymore.

  “And it’s hot here.” I grab her ankle and pull her left leg into a gentle stretch. “Do you remember that summer back in Mexico when it was so hot we tried to bake cookies on your windowsill?”

  The clicks of Grandmother’s rosary beads are my only answer. I bite back the rest of my story, letting the question linger, unanswered, in the air between us. I picture Grandmother standing at the window, watching the cookies bubble in the heat. That was before the stroke, back when she was strong and beautiful. When she leaned forward, the thick gold cross she used to wear swung into the cookies and got covered in gooey batter. She gave me the cross and let me lick it off, like a spoon.

  Now I slide her left leg back onto the bed and cover it with her blanket. Grandmother always said she’d give me that cross some day. She hasn’t worn it since before her stroke.

  I flip open the cardboard box on top of the stack next to her bed, which my mom marked CLOTHING & JEWELRY, and dig through piles of sundresses until I find Grandmother’s jewelry box buried underneath. I open it to find a tangled ball of pearls and beads and thin silver chains. I pick through them, carefully separating the chunky gold cross.

  “Beautiful,” I murmur, slipping the cross over my head. “What do you think, Grandmother? You like?”

  A line of drool spills from Grandmother’s mouth. I drop my arm and wipe it away with my sleeve, cringing. Downstairs, the front door opens and closes. Footsteps creak in the foyer.

  “Sofia?” my mom calls.

  “See you later, Abuela,” I whisper to Grandmother before slipping into the hall.

  Mom stands in the kitchen with her back to me, a bag of groceries sitting on the counter next to her.

  “My class was canceled, so I ran to the supermarket,” she says when I walk in, putting a carton of milk in the fridge. Her green camo scrubs hang limply from her thin frame, and tiny spots of sweat dot the small of her back. “Do you know they sell Bibles next to the tabloids at the cash register?”

  “The nerve,” I say, playing along. Mom doesn’t notice my sar
casm. She shakes her head and pushes the refrigerator door shut. I clear my throat. “So my first day was fine.”

  “What?” she asks, blinking at me. Her short black ponytail pulls at the skin around her face, making her confused expression seem more severe. Then her face relaxes as she remembers. “Right, your new school. Did you make any friends?”

  She says this in such an upbeat, positive way that you’d think I meet dozens of friends every time we move to a new place. In reality, I’m lucky to find one or two people to hang out with for the few months we’re there.

  I study Mom’s face for a moment to figure out if she’s trying to be upbeat or if she’s just oblivious. “Oh yeah. Hundreds,” I say. “They’re actually calling today Sofia Flores Day. Tomorrow I get a parade.”

  Mom opens her mouth—probably to tell me to watch my tone—but then her eyes drop to my neck. She points to the cross I’m still wearing.

  “What’s that?” she asks. Without waiting for me to explain, she holds out her hand.

  There’s no use arguing with her, so I slip the necklace over my head and place the cross in her open palm. “I thought it was pretty.”

  “It’s not meant to be pretty.” She sighs and puts the necklace in her pocket.

  I press my lips together. Sometimes I wonder how it’s possible that she and Grandmother are even related.

  I head back to the kitchen table, unpacking my textbooks while Mom goes upstairs to return Grandmother’s cross to her jewelry box. I finish my homework in silence.

  But later that night, when I’m sure my mom’s asleep, I sneak from my bed and creep, barefoot, into Grandmother’s room. I slip the cross from the cardboard box. Grandmother stares ahead, unblinking, while I shove it into my backpack. Half of her mouth moves in the same slow, wordless prayer while the other half remains twisted, frozen.

  The only sound I hear as I pull her bedroom door shut behind me is the click click click of her rosary beads echoing in the dark.

  CHAPTER THREE

  The next day I wedge myself into one of the narrow green stalls in the girls’ restroom between third and fourth periods. Black and silver Sharpie scrawls cover the door, telling me that Erika is a slut and that love that has been lost was never mine to begin with. A roll of toilet paper stretches across the black-and-white tile. As soon as I slide the lock into place, I hear the bathroom door creak open.

  “Sofia?” The voice startles me, and I stand too fast, smacking my elbow on the plastic toilet paper holder. “Come out, come out, wherever you are.”

  “Riley?” My voice echoes off the bathroom walls. I hadn’t even looked for Riley and her friends this morning, assuming lunch was a one-time thing. They took pity on me and wanted to show me that Adams High wasn’t all animal mutilation and satanic rituals. Still, I fumble with the lock and push the door open.

  Riley leans over one of the sinks, adjusting the silk scarf tied around her neck. She looks like Audrey Hepburn in her sleeveless button-up shirt and high-waisted pants. The fluorescent light flickers overhead.

  “Love the necklace,” Riley says, catching my eye in the mirror as she pushes a perfect brown curl behind one ear. I touch the cross hanging from my neck.

  “Thanks.”

  “We saw you come in,” Alexis explains. She sets her white leather purse next to the dingy porcelain sink and digs out a tube of peach-colored lipstick. Her wispy blond hair trails over the counter as she paints her lips. “Thought we’d say hi.”

  Grace shuts the door, and Riley slides off one of her leather ballet flats and wedges it beneath the frame. She tests the door, but it doesn’t budge.

  “There. Now no one can surprise us.”

  I open my mouth to ask who’s going to surprise us, then think of Brooklyn and the dead cat and close it again. Grace leans against the avocado-green counter. Today she’s tucked her black braids behind a leopard-print headband, and she’s wearing gold platform sandals that add an extra five inches to her height.

  Riley puts her hands on my shoulders. “Sof, do you know how pretty you are?” she asks. “Guys, isn’t Sofia pretty?”

  “You’re so pretty,” Alexis purrs, capping her lipstick.

  “Thanks,” I say, studying their reflections in the mirror. Are they messing with me? My hair is shiny, and my skin can sometimes look golden in the sun, but these girls are perfect. Their skin looks dewy and fresh and completely poreless, even under the bathroom’s harsh fluorescent lights, which are scientifically designed to make everyone look like a zombie.

  I smile, shaking my head. Clearly they’re just being nice.

  Riley slides the hair tie off my ponytail and finger-combs my curls.

  “Look how much better it is down,” she says. She’s right—it is better down, but I’ve been pulling it back so the Mississippi heat doesn’t make it frizz. Already, a thin line of sweat forms on the back of my neck.

  Alexis puts her lipstick back into her purse and removes a flask. I’ve never described a flask as cute before, but hers is tiny and silver, with flowers and vines engraved around the sides. She takes a swig and hands the flask to Grace.

  “You guys drink?” I ask.

  “We’re taking Communion,” Grace says. She closes her eyes and lifts the flask to her lips.

  “Don’t you go to church, Sof?” Riley frowns at my reflection, her fingers still tangled in my hair.

  “My mom doesn’t like church,” I say. “But my grandmother’s Catholic, so I know about Communion.”

  Alexis giggles and holds out her flask to me, but Grace snatches it from her hand before I can reach for it.

  “Wait,” she says. “Sofia can’t have any. Remember? You two wouldn’t even let me touch that flask until I was ‘baptized in the blood of the lamb.’”

  She says the last part with a thick Mississippi drawl. Alexis throws a wadded-up ball of toilet paper at her. “I don’t sound like that,” she says.

  “Grace is right. You can’t have Communion until you accept Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior.” Riley’s voice is light, but there’s a chill in her eyes. She wrinkles her nose at me.

  “Right, my grandmother told me that,” I say. Mom never let me get baptized, but I used to go to church with Grandmother all the time. When it was time to get Communion, the priest put his hand on my head and prayed for me instead of feeding me the host and wine.

  When I look up again, Riley’s staring at my reflection in the mirror. “You know, we could do it now, if you want. Baptize you.”

  I release a short laugh, positive she’s joking. But Riley’s face stays serious.

  “You want to baptize me here?” I blurt out. “In the bathroom?”

  “We have a sink,” Riley says, shrugging. “And, Alexis, you know what to say, right?” Before Alexis can answer, Riley turns on the faucet and plugs up one of the sinks. Water pours into the stained white porcelain.

  “But don’t we need a priest for it to be real?” I ask.

  Riley runs a finger along one of my curls. “It’ll be real to us,” she says. “Like becoming blood sisters. It’s how we’ll all know you’re in the group.”

  I scratch at the skin along my cuticles and pretend to think this over. I had exactly one friend at my last school, and the coolest thing we ever did together was stay up late to watch reruns of Saved by the Bell.

  “Let’s do it,” I say. Behind Riley, the sink fills. Water dribbles over the side and onto the tile floor. Grace leans past her and turns the faucet off.

  “Careful,” she says, but Riley doesn’t seem to hear her. She grins at me, looking so giddy that I find myself smiling, too.

  “Okay, cross your arms like this.” Riley raises her arms in an X over her chest, Alexis’s flask still gripped in one hand. I do the same. “Good,” she says. “Now crouch down so you’re over the sink. Alexis, you have to anoint her head with holy water
.”

  “That’s not holy water,” Grace says. Riley tips Alexis’s flask of wine over the water. A stream of red spills onto the surface, spreading like blood.

  “The wine’s been blessed,” Riley says. “Same thing.”

  I let out a nervous giggle as Alexis dips a finger into the water. A blond eyelash clings to her cheek, making a tiny golden half-moon against her skin.

  “Sofia, I baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.” She touches her finger to my forehead, chest, and both shoulders.

  “Amen,” Riley says. She places one hand at the base of my neck and the other over my crossed arms. I close my eyes and consider praying.

  Before I can decide, Riley pushes my head into the sink.

  The water hits my face like a slap. My eyes fly open, and on instinct I inhale, immediately flooding my lungs. I choke, releasing deep, hacking coughs that fill the water with bubbles and cloud my vision. I blink furiously, staring at the plugged-up drain at the bottom of the sink.

  I try to lift my head, but Riley’s hand is like a weight. I press my fingers into the edges of the sink. The bubbles in front of me turn spotty as my vision goes black. My fingers slacken as I start to lose consciousness when, finally, Riley removes her hand. I whip my head out of the water and gasp and cough. My hair hangs in front of my eyes in sopping-wet clumps.

  Someone mops the hair out of my face. I blink and Riley’s in front of me, her clear, pale eyes bright with excitement.

  “Oh, Sof, are you okay? You did so well!”

  “I think I survived,” I gasp. Bursts of light still dot my periphery, but Riley’s smile is sweet, genuine. She leans forward, kissing me on the cheek.

  “Now you’re one of us,” she says. Her words spark something warm inside me. It flickers like a match. I’m one of them.

  “Now you’re saved,” Riley says.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  “Boo!”