The Absurdity of Fairy Tales

ten

..

Do you see this, maman?

I am dying in your memory.

Do you see me, papa?

I am falling and without you,

I can't climb back up.

..

You know the girl in horror movies who walks along an empty road? Maybe she's skipping or humming a tune under her breath because she doesn't know anything's wrong. She doesn't know she's about to die until the murderer is upon her, his knife at her throat, the weight of him pinning her to the ground.

I envy her, because she doesn't know what's going to happen to her. Truth is I've known what's happening to me since this all started. For the last few weeks, I've been anything but unaware of the monster creeping up behind me steadily, knife poised. After all, it's kind of hard to forget your parents' death-iversary.

I didn't sleep much last night. I drifted off for a bit, but the eighteen-wheeler woke me up each time, lights blinding. My whole body aches; the guilt and grief settles into every crevice, tearing me apart from inside out. I don't want to get up, to open my eyes, to live, so I just curl into myself beneath the covers, unable to be anything but this—sad, as always. (Maybe that's what Aristotle meant: I cannot be anything else but me, and because I'm always sad, I can never be anything but sad. I am either sad or not me.)

Nick enters my room a little while later and sits down carefully on the edge of my bed. Sucks in a shaky breath and lets his hand rest between my shoulder-blades. "Arielle," he whispers, rubbing my back in gentle circles. He knows I'm awake. "Come on, Arielle, you've got to get up for school."

I open my eyes and Nick stares back, face full of concern. Wordlessly, I pull myself upright, fiddling with a loose thread in my sheets. I can't look at Nick as he helps me up; if I do, I'm gone. I don't deserve his concern. My grandmother, who won't get out of bed today, does. His parents do. But I don't. It's my cross to bear.

"Come on," Nick says softly from behind my left shoulder. Unconsciously, a shiver runs down my back. "Go take a shower. I'll pick something out for you."

Finally, I turn to look at him. I have to force myself to meet his eyes, see the worry. The furrow in his brow and the clench of his jaw. The slight widening of his eyes, the stiff draw of his lips. And just like that, he cracks me open.

Nick's got me before the first whimper, arms tight around my waist, one hand cradling the back of my head. I collapse into him, burying my face into his shoulder, the bridge of my nose against his collarbone as I try to remember how to breathe.

When he pulls away, eyes sad, I feel colder than ever. I don't want him to go; I want to just stay here, cradled in the only safe place I know, and forget about life, about school and today's godawful date. But I can't, so I just let him push me into the bathroom and shut the door. And after a few more horrible moments pass, I turn the water on to near-scalding, strip, and get into the shower.

When I step out of the shower ten minutes later, I catch a glimpse of my reflection. I don't recognize the girl who stares back, the one with the dead eyes and sallow face. Immediately, I look away and make sure not to look again, because she scares me worse than any nightmare could.

Nick's not there when I leave the bathroom, but he's left clothes folded on my bed like promised. There's even a bra and a pair of underwear on top of the pile, and as I pull the clothes on, the one part of me that stays untouched by grief, tucked in the far back of my brain, pictures him blushing.