by Amy Cross
I shake my head.
"Good," she says. "I wouldn't want to do that to you." She steps closer and holds out her hand. "I think we should shake hands."
"Why?" I ask.
"That's what friends do. They shake hands when they decide they're going to be friends. It's like a way of saying that they're going to hang out." She smiles. "I mean, if you want to do that. You don't have to; I just thought -"
"It's fine," I say, shaking her hand.
"There!" she says. "We're friends now!"
I turn to look at the barbecue. "It shouldn't take much longer to get hot."
"I'm getting pretty hungry," she replies.
"Me too. I'll go and get some food in a minute, but I want to wait until the plate's as hot as it can get. Otherwise, my father might tell us to turn it off."
"Your father seems a bit weird sometimes," Samantha says.
I nod. "He thinks he's normal and that I'm weird, but I think it's the other way around." I pause for a moment. "Well, in some ways."
She smiles. "What's the worst thing you've ever done?"
"The worst thing?"
"The absolute worst thing you've ever, ever done to anything. Or anyone."
I stare at her. Although we seem to be getting on pretty well, I'm not sure I'm ready to tell her about Martina yet. I mean, that's a pretty big secret, and it's the kind of thing you only tell someone when you're sure they can handle the truth. The last thing I need is for her to go running to her mother to blab. I guess I'd better keep the Martina story to myself for now, although I'm pretty sure I'll end up telling Samantha about it eventually. She's the only person in the world who might actually understand why I did what I did.
"I'll go first," she says suddenly. "I once used a match to burn my cat's whiskers. He started walking in circles. It was weird."
"I killed a cat," I say.
Her eyes widen. "Are you serious?"
I nod. "It was my father's girlfriend's cat. He was miserable anyway, so I felt like I was doing him a favor. I took a pair of scissors and I stabbed him in the head."
She stares at me.
"It was really quick," I add, realizing that I might have gone too far. "He was kind of dead already," I say, backtracking slightly in case I've scared Samantha away.
"That's so cool," she says eventually, as a smile breaks out across her face. "I'd love to do something like that. How did it feel when you pushed the scissors through its skull?"
I shrug. "It didn't feel like much," I explain, as I reach out and hold my hand near the barbecue to check whether it's warm enough yet. "I just did it, and then I brought it home. That's where Harry the maggot came from."
"That's like the most awesome story I've ever heard," she says. "The biggest thing I've ever killed is a slug, and I thought that was pretty big." She stares at me. "You're like my hero, Juliet."
I smile. "It was nothing."
"It wasn't nothing!" she replies, clearly enthused. "You've, like, taken it a step up. You've got to a new extreme. Most people talk about doing weird stuff, but they don't actually go through with it." She drops down onto her knees and clasps her hands together. "I mean it, Juliet! You're my hero!"
I start laughing.
Getting back up, she turns and looks at the barbecue. "Is it ready yet?"
"I don't know," I reply. "Is it sizzling?"
She leans a little closer to the surface of the plate. "I don't hear anything."
I stare at her for a moment. "Maybe get a little closer," I say, suddenly feeling a strange mood pass through me. I like Samantha, but I feel like I need to show her another side of my personality. After all, it's one thing to be impressed that someone killed a cat, but she might not really understand everything about me. I need to make sure that we're on the same wavelength, and that she's okay with the darkness that's in my heart. Then, and only then, will I know that she's ready to hear the truth about Martina's death. We need to share something serious.
"Still nothing," she says, leaning so close that her ear's just a few inches from the plate.
I step closer. "Keep trying," I say.
She smiles as she leans in a little further. "I can feel it's hot."
"But is it sizzling?"
She shakes her head.
"Are you sure?" I start to raise my hand, ready to push her down onto the heat, but at the last moment I'm struck by an odd thought: what if I'm going too far? What if I'm about to ruin my first and only friend? Maybe I should just accept things as they are, rather than pushing her to an extreme and waiting to see if she truly understands me? I pause for a moment, and then I realize I'm being weak. I have to do this; it's the only way to find out if Samantha truly, honestly understands my darkness. I'll do it to her, and then she can do it to me. It'll be like a pact between us.
"Maybe," she says, starting to move away from the plate.
"Try again," I say, grabbing her head and forcing her face down against the barbecue.
Chapter Seven
Today
"It's cold," I whisper after a few seconds have passed.
She doesn't reply; she just stares at me, still pressing the curling iron against my face.
"It's cold," I say again. I was expecting to feel my skin burn, but there's nothing. Just cold metal pressed against the flesh. Did she make a mistake?
"I know," she replies, pulling it away and tossing it across the room. "Of course it's cold. What kind of fucking monster do you think I am? I told you, Juliet. We're not alike. Maybe you could summon up the spite to burn someone on purpose, but I couldn't. I just wanted you to feel the fear." With that, she lets go of me and sits back. "I'm not gonna actually..." Her voice trails off.
"Are you sure?" I ask.
She nods. It's as if she's suddenly been taken over by an overwhelming sense of sadness. I came here expecting anger, and for a moment it seemed as if that was exactly what I was seeing in her eyes; but now she just seems totally deflated.
"I just want to be by myself," she says quietly.
"Will you -"
"Scott's coming over later," she mutters, getting to her feet and sitting back on the stool by her dresser. "I need to re-apply my make-up."
"Has he seen the scar?" I ask, still sitting on the floor.
"Of course he's seen the fucking scar," she says, opening a tub of concealer. "He says he doesn't mind it."
"Do you believe him?"
She turns to me, and for a moment there's anger in her eyes again. "He loves me," she says eventually. "I guess you don't understand, but when someone loves you, they don't care about your flaws. They just love you for who you are." She pauses for a moment. "It's like if someone could see past the fact that you're an evil bitch, Juliet, and decided that for some insane reason they actually gave a shit about you."
I take a deep breath. She's right. It's one thing to ignore someone's scar and love them for their personality, but it's quite another to see past the evil that exists in a person's heart. I guess one of the reasons I've never even thought about having a proper relationship with a guy is that I know there's only one type of person who'd ever be attracted to me; only someone who has the same kind of darkness in their soul could ever want to get close to me, and I'm scared of what might happen in that kind of situation.
"Don't worry about me," Samantha continues, turning to look at herself in the mirror while she starts applying her make-up. "If you think I'm gonna do something stupid like kill myself, you're wrong. If I was gonna do that, I'd have done it years ago."
"Yeah," I say quietly. It's weird, but although I haven't seen Samantha for eleven years, and although we were only really friends for a few hours all that time ago, I've always thought that I'd come back and see her one day. Now that I've done it, and now that I realize it won't happen again, I realize I'm going to miss her in some crazy way. I know she wasn't really my friend, but whenever my father complained about the fact that I've never really had friends, I've always thought that maybe Samantha was the clo
sest I'd ever managed to get; now I see that this was all just a delusion, and that this is goodbye.
"Can you do one thing for me?" she continues. "When you go downstairs, before you leave, can you take the gift back? I don't want to have to open anything that you gave me."
"Are you sure?" I ask, getting to my feet. "It's a -"
"Take it," she says firmly.
I nod, before turning and walking to the door. As I'm about to leave, I feel a burning pain in my ribs. I think I really might have some fractured bones.
"Juliet," Samantha calls out.
I turn to her.
"I'm sorry I hit you."
"It's okay," I say.
"I just..." She stares at me. "Well, that's my apology. I know it probably doesn't mean much, but you can have it anyway." She pauses. "Is there anything you want to say to me, before you go?"
"Not really," I tell her.
She sighs and continues with her make-up.
Once I've walked out of her room, along the landing and down the stairs, I realize that maybe Samantha was waiting for me to apologize for what I did to her face. I mean, I might have muttered the word 'sorry' a few times, but I've never given her a genuine apology. I suppose I could go back upstairs and say something, but I get the feeling she wouldn't want to see me again. I've got what I came for, so why push things any further?
"So let me get this straight," says Jennifer Mathis, her voice whispering in my ear, "you killed Lizzie, and then you killed Piotr Cymbalista because you found him annoying, but you're not going to kill Samantha?"
"I didn't come here to kill her," I say quietly, under my breath.
"But still," she continues, "you could. You know I'd help you."
"It's not why I came."
She laughs. "I know that, silly. You came because you wanted to experience an emotional release, just like the one you experienced when you first came to the abandoned ward. Well if that's what your heart desires, just come and see me. You know I can give it to you."
Hurrying through to the front room, I immediately find that the other guests are sitting mostly in silence. Some awkward glances are directed at me, and it becomes pretty clear that they heard the fight I had with Samantha. Without saying anything, I walk quickly over to the table of gifts and grab the box I brought earlier, and then I head back out and make my way to the front door. As I slip my shoes back on and hurry outside, I allow myself to briefly think that I'm going to get away without my father asking what happened; as I'm walking toward the sidewalk, however, I hear the door open behind me.
"Juliet!" he calls out. "What the hell happened up there?"
"Nothing," I say, refusing to look back at him.
"Nothing?" He runs up behind me and grabs my shoulder, spinning me around to face him. "What do you mean? We all heard you arguing. It sounded like a wrestling match up there!"
"It was nothing," I say again, avoiding eye contact.
He sighs. "So you haven't seen the girl for eleven years, and within an hour of walking through the door, you're engaged in some kind of fist fight?"
"I can't help noticing that no-one came up to help," I point out.
"We were all too shocked," he replies. "Juliet, if you can't even stay calm and polite for an hour in the company of other people, how the hell are you going to manage when you go to college?"
"Maybe I won't have to," I say. "Maybe I'm not going to college."
He stares at me with that kind of cold-eyed intensity that means he's really pissed off.
"So what are you going to do instead?" he asks. "Sit around here on your ass for the rest of your life?"
"I can work," I say quietly.
"Are you scared of college?" he continues. "Are you scared of going and having to interact with all those people?"
I shrug. This is definitely not the kind of conversation I want to be having right now.
"We're going to talk about this later," he says. "You worry me, Juliet. Sometimes I think you're slipping back into your old habits. Every time you take a step forward, you end up taking two or three back again. I thought things had changed, but you're right back where you started." He looks down at the gift in my hands. "You can't take that away with you."
"She doesn't want it."
"I don't care," he says, grabbing it from my hands. "When you give a gift, you don't take it back."
"She asked me to take it," I say firmly, taking it back from him. "I don't have time to stand here arguing. I tried to talk to her, and it didn't work, and in case you're wondering, she was the one who hit me, okay? And before you ask: yes, I'm fine, thanks for your concern. Just a few fractured ribs and some bruising." I glance over his shoulder and see Samantha staring down at me from one of the upstairs windows. Our eyes meet for a moment, and I realize she's re-applied her make-up to cover up the scarring. "I have to go," I mutter, before turning and walking away from my father. To my relief, he doesn't follow me this time. I guess he finally understands that there's nothing he can do to help me. This is just who I am; it's what I am. I can't change; even if I could, why would I try? It's taken long enough, but I feel like I'm finally learning to deal with my darkness and turn it into something positive. Besides, I have a friend. Jennifer Mathis is the only friend I'll ever need.
Chapter Eight
Eleven years ago
"What about the scarring?" my father asks, sitting at the kitchen table as he talks to Mary on the phone. He listens for a moment. "They can do amazing things these days. They'll probably have -" He pauses for a moment. "I know, but it takes time. They probably have to let it heal for a little while, and then they can start the process of fixing it properly." Another pause. "I know. But the important thing is to look on the bright side and make sure she realizes this won't affect her forever." He glances across the room and sees me; there's a look of cold anger in his eyes, as if he hates the sight of me. "I'm going to talk to her now. Will you call me as soon as there's any news?" Another pause. "Okay, Mary. Take care. And again, I'm so sorry." He puts the phone down.
I turn to walk back to my bedroom. It's getting late, and I'm tired.
"Where do you think you're going?" my father says.
I stop and look back at him.
"Well?" he asks.
I open my mouth to reply, but I have no idea what to say. It's been five or six hours since the ambulance took Samantha away, and I've spent most of the time in my room.
"Aren't you going to ask how she is?" he continues. "Don't you care enough to even want to know if she's okay?"
I swallow hard.
"It's a third-degree burn. Do you know what that means? It means the damage has gone all the way through, and she'll have permanent scarring. It means the nerve endings have been destroyed, and they might never recover. There was also some damage to one of her eyelids, but fortunately it was only on the edge. By a miracle, the actual eyeball wasn't burned, so there's no threat to her sight." He stares at me. "Another couple of millimeters, Juliet, and you could have blinded her on one side."
I pause for a moment, before turning to head to my room.
"Come and talk to me," he calls out.
I keep going. Once I'm through the door, I hear him following, and I turn to find him standing behind me. "I'm tired," I say. "I want to go to bed."
"You're going to see Dr. Larson tomorrow," he says, staring down at me. "I called him this evening and told him what happened. He's scheduled an emergency session so he can talk to your properly. He's very worried, Juliet. This is a clear escalation of your problems. You've manifested violent tendencies."
"It was an accident," I lie.
"No-one believes that. Juliet, this is serious. It's one thing to be a little weird and to like being on your own, but it's something else entirely to physically hurt someone. What you did today was really, really worrying. You crossed a line. Dr. Larson was shocked when I told him. He thought you were making progress. We both did; we thought you were getting better, and then you go and do somethin
g that's a thousand times worse."
"It was an accident," I say again.
"No, Juliet. It really wasn't." He pauses for a moment. "Why did you do it?"
"It was an accident," I repeat.
"You turned the barbecue on by accident? You pushed Samantha's face down onto the hot-plate by accident?"
I stare at him.
"It wasn't an accident," he continues, "and no-one's going to accept that explanation. You burned her deliberately. The doctors say that the level of damage is consistent with two or three seconds of direct exposure. You can't accidentally do that to someone. You must have held her down. Why, Juliet? Why the hell would you ever do something like that? What kind of -" His voice trails off, but it's pretty clear he was about to refer to me as a monster.
"I'm tired," I say, turning to walk over to my bed. I only get a couple of paces before he grabs my shoulder and turns me back around to face him.
"This isn't okay!" he shouts, his face becoming a little red. "Whatever's wrong with you, Juliet, you have to stop it! Whatever crazy ideas go through your head, you have to straighten them out! I'm not going to tolerate this anymore! You're not going to act like this evil little monster, do you understand?"
I stare at him, and after a moment I can't help but smile. It's that same reaction I get whenever I see someone in an emotional state. Instead of sympathizing with them, or listening to them, or comforting them, I just smile instinctively. I wish I could stop, but I can't.
"Don't grin at me like that," he says, staring at me with such anger that for a moment I think he might actually slap me. In a way, I wish he'd let go of his inhibitions and show me the full force of his rage, but eventually he steps back. "I'm sorry, Juliet. I shouldn't have said some of those things. You're not evil and you're not a monster, okay? Just... Just go to bed and we'll talk some more in the morning. I'm going to stay up and wait for Mary to call." He turns and walks out of the room, pulling my door shut as he goes.
I stand by my bed, enjoying the emptiness of the room. It's weird, but I feel like everything is still vibrating slightly from the loudness of my father's anger.
