Kiss of Broken Glass (2 page)

and I wanted so badly for him to say,

“See that building?

The one over there?

That’s our new home.

Just for me and you and Sean.”

Then we’d be so overjoyed

we’d turn into kites

and we’d glide down 1,353 feet

into our new lives.

But that’s not what happened.

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Dad muttered something like,

“Too bad your mother and Avery missed this.”

Then a cloud passed across the sun

and the city grew suddenly gray

and the cat’s cradle fizzled like

a spent candlewick.

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The nurse who works night shift

waves me over to the counter

with her roly-poly arms.

She’s eaten way too many Ding Dongs.

“You’re in three B with Donya,” she says.

“But don’t you act like that rotten girl.

Not if you want to get outta here.”

I see a purple Mohawk poke out of the bedroom

followed by Donya’s pale blue eyes.

She waits for Ding Dong to turn her back

then flicks her middle fingers,

two at once,

double-barreled.

Donya’s the kind of girl I like right away.

She slips down the hall and I follow her

to a room where kids are squished in beanbag chairs

watching a flat-screen TV bolted behind thick plastic.

They turn to look at me and I can feel their eyes

crawling on my skin like red ants,

measuring,

           judging,

                 labeling,

just like at school.

The Donya pulls me aside

and tells me how she’s been

committed five times

and that the Baker Act

is a giant Epic Fail

just like everything else in Florida.

“I can’t wait till I’m eighteen,” she says.

“So I can ditch this moron state.”

I ask her why she’s here—at Attaboys,

and she gives me one of those

zigzag answers that don’t say anything specific.

Just that she hates life.

In general.

“You can see how that’s a problem, right?” she says.

Then she tells me how easy it is

to hide your feelings around here.

“All you gotta do is
pretend
to be happy.

These Sunshine Suckers eat it up.”

Then she tells me to say:

Yes

I’ll eat their slimy green Jell-O.

No

I don’t mind sharing my life story

with total strangers.

Yes

I’m feeling so much better now.

No

I’ve never heard voices.

She looks at the bandages on my arm.

“And for God’s sakes,

don’t say anything stupid

like algebra homework

makes you want to kill yourself.

Not even as a joke.

There’s no jokes in here.

Just reasons for them to keep you longer.”

Donya shuts up and motions toward the door.

The night nurse is walking in.

“Lights out, my little bandulus,” Ding Dong says.

And it’s kind of sick,

but everyone gets up,

without saying a word,

and we follow her down the hall.

Like the good little Baker Actors that we are.

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Ding Dong stands in the doorway

clicking a pineapple sucker between her teeth.

She takes the soap bar when I’m done,

squeezes a lump of Colgate on my fingertip,

and watches so I don’t strangle myself with dental floss.

When she’s gone, I open my nightstand

looking for something to read,

but all I find are notes

scribbled inside the drawer.

I want to get out of here

F U Attaboys

Help

Then I lie down on my cold, stiff sheets,

and I kick myself for the millionth time.

You freaking idiot!

Why didn’t you just wait till you got home?

And I listen to Donya

grinding her teeth

and the sound of traffic

gunning across the bridge,

and I think about all the people

outside our shatterproof window,

coming and going,

           laughing and living,

                 hoping and dreaming,

sharpening their

perfect little pencils

and never
once
thinking

about breaking the plastic

to take out the blade.

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A terrible dream where I’m running

down a dark country road

and lightning is slashing

across the purple sky.

Then I see this horse.

A gruesome, white, wild-eyed horse.

Rearing in a barren field.

Tearing its flesh on the barbed wire fence.

I bolt awake.

My heart pounding.

Fingers cold.

I look around for my alarm clock,

and the anime poster on my wall,

and the lava lamp I got for Christmas.

But they’re not there.

Then, slowly, the room comes into focus,

and I see Donya’s spiky hair,

and the rubber-soled socks on my feet,

and the wristband on my arm that says:

Patient #349817

And it feels like my heart stops

as I remember where I am.

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It’s time for group therapy.

I don’t
have
to talk.

But Roger says it’s better if I do.

He asks me to go first

and I decide to get it over with

because pretty much everyone

is squirming in their seats

dying to know what juicy business

brought me to Attaboys.

So I tell them my whole story,

about the bathroom,

and the pencil sharpener,

and Tara-the-Two-Face.

I’m not embarrassed to talk about it,

because
everybody’s
cutting at my school.

Even Tara.

I say how the girls like to compare

their scars

and their slits

and their checkerboard ankles.

We teach each other things, too,

like how to hide pins in our mattress seams,

and steal blades from a dad’s double-edged razor,

and how to break bottles in terry cloth

so they won’t make a sound.

And we share our best lies,

the ones that will fool any mother—

cat scratches,

bike wipeouts,

shaving nicks.

It’s kind of like a club, I say.

Sisters of the Broken Glass.

Roger raises up his hand, stop-sign straight.

He talks about making positive choices

and all that other kumbaya crap,

but nobody’s listening.

Donya sticks out her tongue

and I see a silver stud pierced through the tip.

It makes me think about the time

I jammed a sewing needle

straight through my earlobe

without even numbing it.

Pop!

I remember the tickly, fizzy way that made me feel

like drinking root beer on a roller coaster.

And the memory makes something go

click,

           
click,

                       
click

inside my head like a trigger.

I start to fixate on the paper clip stuck to Roger’s folder.

The one with all those shiny, sharp possibilities.

I imagine the clip uncurling, transforming,

becoming straight and strong and stiff,

just like an arrow.

A few beads of sweat form on my neck

near the vein that beats faster every time

something really good or really scary is about to happen.

I bet I can swipe that clip when Roger isn’t looking,

and I have to bite the inside of my cheek

so nobody sees how excited that idea makes me.

Then I remember what Donya said.

How they can keep me here

even
longer
than 72 hours

for something as lame as a paper cut.

So I sit on my hands

and try to get a song stuck in my head instead,

and send screaming telepathic messages to Roger

to put that freaking paper clip away

before the
click
,
click
,
click

shoots a bullet in my brain.

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Roger really wants to know.

He waits for me to answer,

then leans in and looks at me

with eyes so dark and doelike

they make me get all Bambi-ish inside

and for a split second I think about telling him.

But then something coils around me

like a boa constrictor

squeezing,

           tightening,

                 crushing,

until I choke out the words to make it stop.

“I can quit
anytime
,” I say.

Then I slump back in my seat

and stare at my laceless shoes

and wait for the snake to slither

back into my head.

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“I’ve tried to quit,” she says.

I notice her scarred, bony arms,

her black, bulging eyes,

and the hollow sag of her cheeks.

She reminds me of the baby robin

that fell from its nest two springs ago.

The one I cupped in my hands and fed

with an eyedropper every time it cried:

Mashed potatoes. Egg yolk. Cod-liver oil.

I remember how the fluff disappeared

from the baby bird’s head and how

pinfeathers sprouted from its wings.

I’m surprised when Roger says the girl’s name.

Skylar.

Like the bright blue sky

on the day I released the robin.

I remember feeling all tangled up inside that day.

Happy to set the bird free. Sad to watch it go.

I think about how enormous that feeling was,

like a balloon blowing up inside my heart,

bigger and bigger, until all I wanted to do was find

a way to let the feeling out before my heart popped.

I think about how I tried to follow the bird with my eyes.

To see where it landed in the tall cypress trees.

But then Avery sprayed me with the hose

and made me jump two feet, and she laughed

when I couldn’t find the bird anymore.

“Thank God that little crapper’s out of here,” she said.

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It’s all her mother’s fault. For heaping

so many unnecessary calories on her plate.

She jabs a finger at her SkinnyJeans.

“I’m
huge
,” she says.

“I had to stop eating.

What else could I do?”

Nobody answers.

I look at Roger, with his cheap, coupon haircut

and his brown Walmart shoes and I wonder

how someone like that could ever help any of us.

But then he does something unexpected.

Something almost promising.

He get one of those
aha
looks in his eye

and he hops out of his chair,

and for a split second, I feel a flutter of hope.

But then he stops behind Skylar’s seat.

Waiting.

Expectant.

Motioning with his hands

like we’re supposed to do something.

“Well come on, Group,” he says at last.

“What do
you
think Skylar should do?”

And that’s when I realize

I was right all along.

Roger doesn’t have the answers either.

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But there’s no point in free time because

there’s nothing to do. I think of all the text

messages piling up on my cell phone.

Holy crap!

WTF?

R U there?

I wish I could answer them.

But, my phone is locked

in the secured room,

along with the blade I hide

in the battery compartment.

My stomach starts to knot.

What if Rennie called?

I know she’s my best friend and all.

But she gets pissed when I don’t answer.

I mean,
really
pissed.

Or what if there’s a text about Tara

spreading lies?

Or what if there’s a message from

Chase Grayson, the Soccer God,

and he says something

sweet and adorable like

uok?

and I’m stuck in this oatmeal pit,

cut off from civilization,

missing my one and only chance

to talk to the boy I’ve had a crush on