Lies We Bury(85)

She lunges for them, and I get to my feet, preparing for her redoubled attack, but she pivots toward Lily. Grabbing her by the arm, she yanks Lily upright, then opens the scissors and presses a blade to Lily’s neck. I raise the gun instantly, mirroring her stance. Blue veins visible under Lily’s pale skin beat furiously for two.

“Give me the gun,” Jenessa says to me, each word a threat. “Or I’ll do it.” She presses the blade into Lily’s throat, but Lily is mute, fear crippling any sound.

I keep the barrel trained on Jenessa’s head and try to remember what I learned and never mastered at the gun range. To ignore the orange’s juicy insides smeared across the wall and the memory of Oz’s face when I threw the dart in the bar and missed the target by feet.

This is not a good idea.

“Marissa. Give me. The gun!” A bead of red appears on Lily’s skin. “Now.”

Voices travel the walkway leading to the door. The police. Lily’s eyes widen to the point of resembling blue discs. Seeing my sister in this state, at the hands of our other sibling, panic swells in me and threatens to take over—shaking my frame and dissolving my strength into sobs—before the emotion shifts. Changes shape. Trembles into the fury I’ve worked to subdue my whole life.

The sweat on my fingers makes my grip slippery, and I readjust both hands. “You can’t do this to us. I won’t let you after everything we already survived.”

“You deserve to rot in prison for what you did to me. I’m only settling a debt.”

Hearing Jenessa speak the words I believed for most of my life—recalling the shame that always surfaced when I thought about the day that we escaped, never realizing that guilt was due to my betrayal of Jenessa—I consider whether she’s right.

Consider it, and yet finally know in my bones she’s wrong. “I don’t deserve prison, Jenessa. I’ve messed up, and I’m deeply, deeply sorry for hurting you. But this is not how you move forward. How we move forward together.”

Footsteps climb the porch steps.

“Marissa. The gun! Now!” Jenessa’s voice shakes, but the scissors remain steady on Lily’s throat.

I could shoot her. Shoot her and be done with this nightmare, be justified in the act, and no one would judge me for it or say I had bad blood. Everyone would understand.

“Em,” Lily whispers. “Please. The baby.”

Someone knocks at the front door. “Police! Open up!”

Another moment passes in which no one moves. Then I slowly bend my knees and lower the gun to the floor. Jenessa’s eyes fixate on my face. A mixture of stunned and hurt. She watches until I release the gun.

“I always wished you had done that,” she says. “Chosen me over yourself.”

Wooden splinters explode from the doorway as two police officers crowd inside. “Police! Drop your weapon!”

Jenessa whirls, keeping the blade pressed to Lily’s neck. She inches Lily in front of her body, and the younger cop sucks in a breath at seeing Lily’s pregnant bulge.

“I said, drop your weapon! You won’t get another warning—”

I snatch the gun from the ground, aim for Jenessa’s foot, and pull the trigger. A shot goes off, and the police shout something, many things, and train their guns on me. I drop mine and blink hard—again—before I take my eyes from my sisters.

Lily flew forward onto the couch, thrown by Jenessa’s momentum, while Jenessa fell sideways into the armchair. She stares at the gaping wound in her thigh, the trail of blood dripping to the ground, before lifting haunted eyes to mine.

She never really left the basement, not in the sense that the rest of us did. Granted, she stayed behind—risked herself in an act of love and generosity beyond her seven years of living. But she’s been in a prison of her own ever since, believing what I often struggled with—that she wasn’t loved. That she would never be enough.

I toe my messenger bag under the watchful glares of the police officers barking words I don’t hear. The scene of my two sisters in such physical and emotional pain is almost too much to bear up close. The intense urge rises in me to withdraw my camera from its case. To angle the lens and position the viewfinder. Instead, I close my eyes and imagine the comforting release.

Click.





Thirty-Four

MISSY





THEN


Outside it’s nighttime and hot and I’m so tired and scared but Mama won’t let us go home. And this is not how Mama Rosemary described nighttime in the outside. I ask Mama why it’s so hot and she doesn’t answer.

We should be in bed. Mama should be reading us a story like she always does when we can’t sleep. I ask Mama if the man is still in the basement with Jenessa and she doesn’t answer again.

We walk fast. Harder than we ever did during exercise hour and I’m carrying Sweet Lily’s baby blanket. When I lose my shoe that’s too small Mama Rosemary says to leave it. And she says stop asking so many questions.

We pass houses and big tall light-trees too bright for night. I cover my eyes and hold on to Mama’s shirt. We walk harder and longer than ever then get to a new road. Mama Rosemary puts Sweet Lily to the ground to rest and Sweet Lily starts to cry. Mama makes soothing noises and picks her back up.

“Mama Rosemary? Is Jenessa okay? Why did we leave? We’re supposed to be out front of the house.”