Cold Springs(11)

Katherine stared at the mirror, smiling at the girl there. She looked like her mom, only younger, without the frustrations of raising some stupid kid.

Katherine wished her mother had gone back to college. Goddamn it, but Katherine would have preferred that. She'd rather have her father at home, away from Laurel Heights, and her mother out making the money. Hadn't they thought of that? Didn't it occur to them it would make them all happier?

The pleasing sensation of floating off the ground wasn't working as well as Katherine had hoped. She could hear Sebastian the Crab singing in the living room. Should she check on Mallory? No. She'd be fine.

Katherine tried to remember—had she shot up yet? It didn't feel like it. Her friend had warned her, You may not get the right high off this batch. You may need to try a little more.

That's what it is, Katherine decided. Weak drugs. Weak, like everything else.

She went through the process again—holding the lighter under the spoon, jerking back her thumb when she realized she'd been holding it too close to the flame without even feeling it. The tip looked like she'd dipped it in charcoal. She put it in her mouth and started to giggle. Don't suck your thumb, m'hijita.

Finally, she shot up . . . was it for the second time?

She felt better now, like she was encased in cotton. She stood up from the toilet and her feet sank several inches into the floor. She made her way to the bed, dropped onto the sheets. She tried to touch her face, but she wasn't sure whether she was stroking a pillow or her own cheek.

Above her, upside down, were the pictures on the headboard—the cow and the moon and the stars that had kept her company since she was little. Where had they come from? Hadn't she covered them up?

She could hear her own breathing, felt the breath being reflected back on her face, as if she were against a window.

She remembered crawling into her parents' bed when she was small, her head next to Daddy's, listening to him while he slept. She tried to align her breathing to his, but his breaths were too deep. She couldn't hold that much air in her lungs without bursting. She couldn't go that long between breaths without suffocating. She had felt a failure, not being able to match her father's rhythm. So she had stayed up, unable to sleep, studying his closed eyes, the small freckle on his right eyelid, the blond lashes you never noticed when he was awake.

The Little Mermaid was playing, somewhere far away. Her mother and father needed her to stay in bed a little longer. It was too early to get up—too early even for cartoons.

Katherine closed her eyes. She felt her breath slowing, aligning itself at last to her father's.

Mallory got up once during the video and went into Katherine's bedroom. Katherine was asleep on the bed. The air smelled funny—like a toaster.

There was a spoon on the floor, and when Mallory picked it up, it was warm. She dropped it.

“Katherine?” she called, trying very hard to say the th right. Her teacher had been coaching her on that sound. They played a game with flashcards. Math. Bath. Katherine.

Mallory pressed on Katherine's shoulder, called her name again. But Katherine kept sleeping.

She didn't want Katherine to be mad at her.

She went back into the living room. She curled up in the big black chair and rubbed Katherine's necklace between her fingers. There was a silver rectangle on the necklace, with words on the back, but Mallory couldn't read many words yet. She was in kindergarten.

She watched more of the video.

Maybe her parents would come back soon. If Katherine was asleep, it must be time for bed.

But they didn't come back.

The video ended. There was fuzz on the screen.

Mallory tiptoed back into the bedroom. There was something funny about Katherine's face now. It was as if Katherine were taking a nap in a swimming pool, at the bottom of the shallow end. Her skin looked that color.

Mallory tried to wake her up, but she couldn't. Katherine's hand was really cold.

Mallory's stomach felt like she'd eaten too much candy.

She was scared Katherine would wake up and get mad, and her eyes and her mouth would be like that dark house. Mallory tried to think how to call her parents. She knew her own number at home. She had memorized it. But her parents wouldn't be at home. They were at the school party. They'd said.

There was one other number her mother had taught her for emergencies. Mallory was scared to get in trouble for calling it, but she was more scared to be alone with Katherine sleeping, her face the wrong color.

She stood on a kitchen stool so she could reach the phone. She dialed—wrong at first, 119, and nothing happened. Then she remembered the nine went first, and she dialed again.

The woman on the other end of the line asked Mallory a question she didn't understand, but Mallory told her what the problem was, anyway. Carefully, she said, “Katherine won't wake up.”

The woman asked her some more questions. She told Mallory not to hang up, but Mallory was scared by her tone—hard and not friendly, just like a robot's. Mallory hung up. She went back into the living room, and turned the big black chair around, facing the bedroom doorway. The phone rang, but she didn't answer it. She knew it was the woman with the hard voice—and she didn't know what else to say to her. Just hurry. Tell my parents to hurry.

She held Katherine's necklace in her hand, wrapping and unwrapping it around her wrist. The silver smelled like vinegar.