It was Henry who still fought.
He served breakfast in bed. Strong, motherfucking coffee for me, honeyed tea for her. Bacon and pancakes laced in syrup. And on my plate, a small square of Belgian chocolate. The ones that would have me squeeze my legs together and feel.
“I’ll let you…”
His words drifted as he shut the door behind him.
Alice sat, crossed her legs, and picked up her plate. Bacon and pancakes? You’d have to wrestle her from it. Before.
She put the plate down on her nightstand.
“Where are we?” she sighed.
“I’m right here,” I said, discarding my plate but cherishing the coffee. David was thick on my voice.
“And?” she asked, voice trembling.
“It’s a good thing.”
“I can’t…no…”
She took a breath, but her nose didn’t twitch.
“I don’t even know how to wake up.”
Her eyes flooded.
“This isn’t you! I’m supposed to know what to say…how to touch you!”
“I just feel…him…”
“David? The one you’ve been…”
“No,” I interrupted, “Frank. What he saw, what he did. And I get it.”
She froze.
“No fucking way, babe!”
“I see what he saw.” I pointed to the mirror, “Some dumb as boy dressing up, growing tits. But it doesn’t cure the ugly.”
“Fuck you, Veronica. You fucking promised!”
She leaned in.
“Next time, fucking stab me in the heart, slit my throat, because I can’t do this. I fucking can’t do this!”
She took my hands.
Collected herself.
“We’re so close, babe. Look at what we’ve accomplished. All our fucking victories. Frank? Is that who you are going to let define you?”
My Alice. Torn to shreds over someone like me. Even to this day, I don’t honestly believe I deserve her. Yet, here I am.
She smiled.
“Mom. She could have defined me, made me a victim. The small moments of us, the beauty in the cracks, should define us. But fuck me…we need to decide for ourselves.”
She dried her tears, her sniffling nose.
“You grow more beautiful every day, and soon you’ll break free. Just…fucking days, and you can put him to rest and fully blossom, babe.”
Again with the fucking certainty, no fucking doubt in her mind. So effortlessly her.
“That’s easy for you to say, babe,” I muttered, frustrated. “You’re so effortlessly beautiful.”
She exhaled sharply. Not a laugh, not even a smirk—just a breath.
“Effortless.” She rolled the word on her tongue like it was bitter.
Then, before I could react, she grabbed the hem of her shirt and lifted it just enough.
“You see that?” she said, pointing. “My left tit’s smaller than my right. It tilts, just slightly differently. You don’t notice, but I do. Every damn day.”
She let the fabric fall, then reached for her collarbone, pressing her fingers against a freckle just beneath it.
“This? This gets darker in the summer. Along with the hundreds of others that pop up like a fucking rash. But I wouldn’t know, would I?” She let out a humorless laugh. “Because I burn before I even think about the sun.”
She turned her head slightly, tugging her hair behind her ear.
“And this?” she asked, tilting her face toward me. “One ear sticks out more than the other. Subtle. But not to me.”
Then, she ran a finger along the inside of her forearm, tracing an old scar.
“And this? Fell off my bike when I was ten. My mom said it’d fade. Never did.”
I sat there, stunned, as she looked at me—really looked at me.
“You ever try being a fat, ginger kid in school?” Her voice wasn’t soft anymore. “Effortless, my ass.”
I swallowed.
She leaned back, watching me, waiting.
I wanted to tell her she was wrong. That she was beautiful, always had been. That none of those things mattered, that no one saw her that way.
But I didn’t say anything.
Because she was right.
I had never seen any of it.
“Every damned day for years, I stood in front of the mirror, forcing myself to see beauty in each and every cursed freckle, my big ear, my fat ass, my ugly tits. Until I did. Until I loved myself entirely. Until I loved myself enough to let it go.”
She snorted. As if recalling those memories brought back old contempt.
“And the way kids would crack jokes about Dad? The mad professor? When there were days when the only thing that kept me standing was his unconditional love, relentless faith, and unapologetic nudge to see…better. Not fucking differently. Better!”
She brushed an angry curl from her eye and stared straight through me.
“You have to learn to use the same eyes you look at me with when you look in the mirror.”
It wasn’t gentle. It wasn’t comforting.
It was a challenge.
And I apologized.
“No, you don’t fucking get it.”
She had never been angry with me before. Not like this.
Her eyes burned, her breath sharp, her voice cutting through me like a blade.
“It’s not me you need to apologize to.”
My mouth went dry.
“You’re a smart girl; you can figure it out. You can fucking see it if you’d stop cowering behind your own bullshit for two goddamn seconds.”
“My bullshit?!” I yelled, “I have a fucking cock! Nothing can cover that up. I have a fucking small, ugly, fucking cock!”
She had to fucking know it, right?
“No one will ever look at me the way I look at you! No one can truly desire me like they desire you!”
“Is this what this is about?” Her voice was cold as ice. “Is that the fucking elephant in your room?”
She sighed. A desperate sound.
“You see what you desire to see. A cock? Have I ever sucked your ‘cock’? It’s there because you’ve fucking decided it to be. I wish I could fucking cum like you do. But fuck you, Veronica, you have to see the ugly in absolutely everything.”
I flinched.
But she wasn’t done.
She shoved her hand between us, pressing her palm against my stomach, right over my navel.
“Here. Right fucking here.” She tapped once, hard, and my whole body tensed. “This is who you’re hurting. This is who you keep tearing apart. And you’re too much of a coward to face her.”
My heart slammed against my ribs.
“You want to apologize?” Her voice dropped, but the force behind it didn’t. “Then do it right. Look her in the fucking mirror and say it out loud.“
Her words knocked the air from my lungs.
“No one will ever look at you the way they look at me?”
The pain in her eyes made me look away.
“What does that make me? That’s the only way I’ve ever seen you.”
Her hand found her face.
“Break the fucking spell, Veronica!”
Silence.
She turned away.
Not just turned, not just shifted.
She turned her back to me.
Her shoulders shook. Her breath hitched.
And then I heard it—a quiet, trembling sound.
She was crying.
She had never turned her back on me before. Not once.
Not fucking ever.
I knew—I fucking knew—that she wasn’t turning away because she didn’t care.
She was turning away because she cared too much and refused to watch me do this to myself anymore.
Because if I didn’t fight for myself…she didn’t know how to keep fighting either.
The way she had spat my name at me.
The name she had given me…
I wanted to apologize.
I put my arm around her, and she didn’t resist.
I pulled her closer, and she leaned in.
“Teach me,” I sobbed.
“Just…use the same eyes that see me, babe.”
***
It was Henry who still pulled.
It was the softest knock on the door, and he found us sleeping in each other’s arms.
“Hey…I just, dinner.”
“Thank you, Dad,” she whispered, “We’ll be right there.”
“I just…I don’t know. I thought maybe a movie, but…well. Turns out the rental place is gone…” He scratched his bird’s nest, “But I got popcorn, at least.”
“Thank you, Henry,” I said—her voice.
He picked up the untouched plates from breakfast.
“Wait,” I said and snatched the chocolate.
We watched him almost leave, to turn, “So, yeah…dinner. I’ll just…”
Her look was enough. She had heard it. But she didn’t press it.
I offered her my hand, and she accepted it.
“Let’s get some food,” I whispered.
She said nothing, just held my hand tight.
I caught a glimpse of me in the mirror.
All David.
But blurred around the edges.
Henry didn’t serve soup.
Henry figured a sloppy burger with greasy fries in front of the TV was comfort.
And damn, Henry, it was all the comfort we dared.
Alice sat up Netflix for him, and he waved goodbye to the rental place.
David’s clothes were still shelter, still a shield, still safe—
But her hand underneath?
That felt like peace.
I can’t recall the movie.
I don’t think any of us can.
And yet, it’s the most important movie we ever watched.
The bowl of popcorn was empty.
Netflix urged us for what we wanted to see next.
Henry yawned, itching for that joint he had been looking forward to all day.
Alice?
Quiet. But there.
Not leaning, not pulling.
Waiting.
“You wanna go upstairs?” I asked, not invitingly, not really, just…asking because that’s what she looked like.
“I want to stay wrapped in this moment…until it goes away. All of it,” she said, not sad, just empty.
The TV stared blankly at us.
Even Henry was at a loss.
She needed me to show some push. That I was trying.
Fucking empty.
Grasping at straws, anything.
I could tell her I felt pretty.
It would be a lie.
“No,” I said, “That’s an illusion.”
Exactly.
You’ve got this, Veronica.
“An object at rest stays at rest,” I said, “And that doesn’t fucking work. So, I’m telling you, we’re going upstairs.”
I took her hand.
“I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing, but it’s motion. One foot in front of the other.”
I don’t think she’d ever held my hand like that.
I wrapped her in her blanket with a promise I would join her, but I had to…girl stuff.
So, while she waited, I stood in front of the bathroom mirror and peeled him off me.
It felt like shredding the only protective layer against the world.
I hated what I saw.
“Your eyes are pretty,” I said.
No real conviction.
“Your eyes. They are pretty.”
My tits. They were pretty. And that blue butterfly between them?
I slid under the covers.
Safe in her pajamas.
Only, I didn’t button them up; I left the front open so I could press against her back.
***
Waking up against Alice was never exactly the same. And waking up not next to her? That felt wrong.
But I only needed my eyes to adjust.
In the middle of the floor, stark naked, joint in one hand, and zen as fuck.
I rustled the sheets, and she hushed.
Her brow furrowed. And her nose twitched.
Then…zen as fuck.
And I watched. And I let myself feel.
The first one, always envy.
She hummed.
I was dreamin’ of the past
And my heart was beating fast
I began to lose control…
Effortlessly in being herself.
Her perfect body. Her slightly tilted breast.
The melody changed.
How you gonna see me now
Please don’t see me ugly babe
‘Cause I know I let you down
In oh so many ways
My eyes flooded.
She hushed.
“Feel it, babe.”
She danced. Slow, to a tune only she heard.
We believed
We’d catch the rainbow
Ride the wind
To the sun
And sail away
Come the dawn
Come the dawn
Come the dawn
Come the dawn
Was she stoned beyond?
No.
Stoned. Baked. High as fuck.
But not beyond.
And it ended in the most Alice way imaginable.
“Fuck. I’m pissing myself.”
She bolted, half-dancing, half-stumbling toward the bathroom, laughing like it was the funniest goddamn thing in the world.
And me?
I just lay there, watching her disappear, my chest aching with something I didn’t have words for.
Another lie.
I ached to see myself through her eyes.
***
Henry was back to buttered toast.
Buttered toast with a square of chocolate on the side.
Buttered toast with a square of chocolate on the side and perfectly kicking coffee.
Alice was with us but on a slightly different plane.
“Dude, those curtains are red! Have they always been this red, Dad?”
Henry sipped his coffee. Unbothered.
“They’ve been that red since before you were born, kid.”
Alice blinked. Stared.
“Nah. That red?”
I smirked into my coffee.
She leaned back, squinting like she was solving a mystery.
Henry just sighed. “For fuck’s sake, Alice, eat your toast.”
“Bacon, Dad? Salty, ravishing, smoked pig, dripping with fat?”
Henry didn’t even look up from his plate. “I’m not cooking you bacon when you’re that high.”
Alice gasped, clutching her chest like he had just shot her. “Betrayal. Utter betrayal.”
“You’re lucky I didn’t let you piss yourself on the floor,” he muttered, taking another sip of coffee.
I nearly choked on mine. Alice wheezed, then collapsed against my shoulder in a fit of giggles.
“Dad, what the fuck?”
Henry buttered another piece of toast. “I’m just saying,” he paused, “just dial it down a notch.”
Then he made bacon.
Alice?
“Titties? You have titties! Woah! I have titties!”
She cupped her own chest like she had just discovered the meaning of life.
Henry didn’t even blink. “Incredible observation, Alice.”
“Babe,” I whispered, trying to rein her in before she took it even further.
She gasped, eyes wide, pupils blown. “You think I can make them do tricks? Fuck! Can yours do tricks?”
Henry sighed and flipped the bacon. “Eat your damn toast.”
***
She crashed on the couch and slept ‘til long in the afternoon, draped in her pajamas and Henry’s plaid shirt.
I retreated to…still her room.
It would have been a large bedroom with any other dweller, but Alice had consumed it. Clutter, mess, clothes, furniture out of place. And all utterly empty without her.
I picked up a shirt. It smelled of her.
As did the skirt.
Everything I touched held her essence.
The ones with too much of her essence went in the laundry hamper; the rest were folded neatly or hung on hangers.
Color fucking coordinated.
Her scrapbooks.
Littered with unfinished poems and drawings.
Underneath a pile of clothes, a guitar.
A guitar with a sticker.
“Flying high again, motherfuckers.”
Her diary.
I shouldn’t.
And I didn’t.
But I did anyway.
Dec. 26th 2003: Dear diary. My aunt gave you to me for Christmas. Now she’s looking at me, so I have to pretend to write in you. I hope life treats you well.
Never cared for, never discarded.
A box full of condoms.
Panties everywhere. Exactly where she’d dropped them.
Definitely her essence.
Burrowing deep inside me.
All in the laundry hamper.
And with each garment moved, with each book back on the bookshelf, and with each scrapbook finding its place in her drawers.
I found some space.
I just needed to find something to fill it with.
***
“Henry,” I whispered, not wanting to wake her.
“Sure?” he said over his book.
I motioned him over—this was too big for her fucking ears.
“Can you show me how to… the laundry? How does it work?”
“You don’t have to—”
“Oh, but I do,” I cut in.
He sighed but didn’t argue, just ushered me down the stairs. It was warm as hell down there—his grow room took up most of the basement.
“Here,” he said, practically shoving me into the laundry room.
“I usually just… that dial and that button.”
I started filling the machine.
“Hang on,” he said. “You’re supposed to—delicates… colors… I don’t really know. Maybe you should let her—”
I shook my head.
“No. This is mine to do.”
Henry rubbed his beard, sighing through his nose.
“Alright, then. But if you shrink her favorite shirt, you’re on your own.”
I smirked. “Wouldn’t be the first time.”
Piece by piece, I sorted the clothes carefully and deliberately. Every shirt, every pair of panties, every crumpled scrap of fabric neatly in their separate piles. Each and everyone held something, her essence, her wreckage, her world.
My fucking everything.
I loaded the first machine.
Mine to clean.
Mine to mend.
Henry leaned against the doorframe, watching.
“Funny,” he muttered.
“What?”
“Never thought I’d see the day someone willingly took on Alice’s mess.”
I shut the machine, set the cycle, pressed start. The hum of water rushing in filled the silence.
I exhaled.
“Right now… I am her mess,” I admitted. “And I’m trying to find a way to un-mess it.”
Henry didn’t say anything. He just stepped forward and wrapped his arms around me.
A hug that told me everything I needed to know.
***
I sat on the bed reading one of her unfinished poems.
Change
It ran several pages.
Several pages of scribbled-out lines, where only few words were left to breathe.
If I was a fairy
I’m a motherfucking fairy
My mother birthed me; a fairy
One word reappearing
Change
My gut sank. I had read her diary with shame, only to find it empty.
But this, fucking right here, was the real thing.
And I couldn’t stop reading.
She’s my fairy, the shining butterfly
She cannot wither; she cannot die!
Several lines cluttered out, scratched out.
No…stabbed out.
I died that night
So many times
Begging, have mercy
Fucking change.
Fuck me…
I put it on the table.
The ‘we need to talk about this’ pile.
I perched the mirror, just right, and put a blanket on the floor.
I undressed, folded everything neatly, and put it into the drawer.
Then I sat in front of the mirror.
Fixed my hair.
Let’s do this, Veronica!
He stared back at me. Dull, distorted.
I closed my eyes.
How you gonna see me now?
When I dared open them, I searched for the ugliest in him. That pointy, weak chin.
Only, it wasn’t there.
Please don’t see me ugly, babe.
So utterly un-zen.
‘Cause I know I let you down.
In oh so many ways.
She found me weeping. Ugly-weeping.
She dropped to her knees beside me, hands hovering, unsure.
“Tell me,” she whispered.
I tried to speak, but the sobs stole my breath.
“I see… traces…” I gasped.
I clutched my chest, my ribs, my throat.
“I see.”
Alice exhaled, shaky. She touched my hair, my shoulder, my cheek.
“Then hold on to that,” she murmured. “Hold on to what you see.”
“Hold on to what I see.”
We sat. She leaned in. I met.
She got naked.
Panties to the floor.
Sat beside me. Gazing into that mirror.
“Babe?”
“Yeah,” I whispered.
“What the fuck did you do to our room?”
My face twisted. Something I hadn’t felt in days.
The mirror told me I smiled.
“Tell me you see that, babe,” she whispered.
I nudged her.
“Tell me.”
I was too consumed.
I have a beautiful smile.
***
Rome wasn’t built in a day, which is probably why they had time to make sure all the roads leading there were made.
The week lingered on, like the flu, not wanting to let go.
Henry started breathing again, although he didn’t leave the house.
Not even for Wednesday’s classes.
But he was running low on dinner ideas and toast.
“There’s an app for that, Dad,” Alice smirked.
“No? Grocery shopping in an app? How would I know the pineapple is ripe?”
She leaned back, stretching like a satisfied cat. “You don’t. You just pay to the algorithm gods and hope they love you.”
Henry grumbled. “I don’t trust anyone else to pick my produce.”
She took the last apple from the bowl because…well…Alice, and took a greedy bite. Chewing with intent.
“Well…” she said, dripping juice down her chin, “You could do old fashioned and go to the grocery store. Knock the pineapple on her bum. If she squirts, she’s done. Pick another one.”
“I can’t.”
“Dad…if you have to, you can tie us down. But seriously. We’ve got this.”
She looked at him with big green eyes. “Okay?”
He sighed.
“No,” he said, his voice trembling. It’s not okay. I’m scared. I don’t know what I’m doing, and even that I’m afraid of doing wrong. Being here, seeing you, hearing you—that’s my lifeline.”
“Thank you,” she said.
She looked at him.
“Seeing your cracks makes me breaking livable.”
Yes, the week lingered on, and each filled crack seemed to open a new rift. Of course Henry was broken, too. And we’d still let him carry us.
Because that’s what Henry does.
Our Sam to Frodo.
And by fuck did Frodo ever need Sam.
Alice didn’t sleep.
She went to sleep but never slept.
I woke up Friday night because she was not there.
It could have been Saturday morning.
Her voice echoed…faint, distant, and not entirely hers.
It came from outside.
May had given us bloom and warm days, but the nights still bit cold.
I pushed the curtains aside, nearly blinded by the clear moon.
The firepan caught my eyes first, burning tall against the night.
Their backyard backed onto a small forest, leading down to the river that’d eventually drain into Tumblers Lake. There were towering willows and bushes; Henry was never much of a gardener.
Then, I saw her. Dancing. Singing.
Naked.
Burning.
Excess.
Fucking overload.
She spun in circles, arms outstretched.
Love, only love
Can bring back our love again
I ran down the stairs, into the living room, and there he stood in the doorway.
Henry just watched. Sighed.
“What’s going on?”
“Spiraling,” he said, a tiredness utterly raw drew his voice, “It’s…happened before.”
I didn’t want to see her like that, but what else could I do?
Whiskey bottle in one hand, joint in the other, gazing at the stars.
Your pride has built a wall
So strong that I can’t get through
Is there really no chance?
To start once again?
She threw the bottle into the forest.
“I fucking love you!”
Not singing. Screaming at the stars.
“Should I go to her?”
“I…don’t know,” he answered, thick with sorrow.
I couldn’t do nothing.
The cold air bit, but seeing her like that? It ate at my heart.
I didn’t know what to say. If anything.
So, I watched her burn.
She turned towards me, but it was like she didn’t see me.
She had always seen me.
She walked past me.
If I could make the world as pure
And strange as what I see
I’d put you in the mirror
“You fucking put in front of me…”
She sobbed.
Then she saw Henry.
“Daddy?” she said, her eyes empty, “I’m crashing.”
Henry was there before she hit the ground.
There was no hot chocolate.
It was too big for even him.
9
1
1
Blue lights flaring.
Henry, broken. Questioned.
My everything wheeled into the back of the ambulance.
I could have cracked. I could have dismantled.
But this time, I couldn’t.
All I could think.
When she opens her eyes, she needs to see me.
And I couldn’t unravel like I had unraveled her. I couldn’t let her see me like I had seen her. I couldn’t scratch my skin and bruise my knees.
Because above everything.
I had to be beautiful for her.
So, when Henry was questioned, while Alice was rescued, while my world was burning, I put on her favorite dress, brushed my hair, and fucking painted my face.
And when she’d open her eyes—the only fucking option—I would be cool as fuck, telling her the one thing on my mind.
“I love you.”
If it was in the back of an ambulance, in the ER, or in a crowded fucking room, that’s who I needed to be and what I needed to say.
Had I known how close to losing her I was, I might have done differently.
Her blood alcohol concentration was at 0.36%.
It was the whole package: oxygen, IVs, stomach pumping. Plenty of time to come undone.
But I swallowed it instead.
Henry paced.
I sat and held her hand.
“You need to get some sleep, Veronica,” he whispered.
“No. I’ve been asleep my entire life, Henry. I need to be the first thing she sees.”
I took his hand and pressed it against my cheek.
“You need to sleep, Henry.”
“How can I? She’s my baby. She’s my everything!”
“Share the load, Henry.”
“What?”
“Get some sleep. I need to do this. For her. For me. She’s my everything, too.”
I looked at him. Pressed his hand.
“And…I’ll need you, Henry. For tomorrow. For the next day and the day after.”
I met his eyes. I smiled.
“I’ve got this.”
***
Morning bloomed outside the hospital, but not for me. It stayed the same. Locked in the same moment it had been for hours.
Henry stumbled through the door.
“I had to…just down the street…the hospital coffee…Any change?”
“Still sleeping,” I whispered.
Henry handed me my cup.
It said “Veronica”.
“Isn’t she beautiful in her sleep? Even her nose is at rest. The way her curls rest, like autumn leaves and not ablaze with fire. I’ve counted the freckles on her face. She has seventy-two, but they’ll be impossible to count when the sun shines brighter. She has dimples on her hands, and her left pinky is longer than her left one.”
I drank her in, just a little more.
“Her left shoulder has more freckles than her right. They spread down her chest and fade, sprinkles against her skin. Her left breast tilts differently than her right. But only she knows.”
I pressed my palm to her belly. “When she sighs from love, it comes from here.”
I moved my hand to her chest. “And this is where her impatience lies.”
I touched her neck, trailing fingers.
“When she shrieks in pain or is pushed beyond pleasure, it’s all in here. She has your smile, Henry. Even in her sleep. Her lips are soft as the wind on a midsummer evening.”
I touched her cheek.
“But her eyes are all you need to know. She sees like no one else. Through the cracks, through the illusion, until you’re naked in front of her.”
I almost cried.
Breathe.
“And she sees me beautiful.”
Henry sank into the chair. Breathed.
“That is true love, Veronica,” he said, not even trying to hide his tears.
“No,” I smiled, “That’s just Alice.”
I sipped my coffee.
Listened to Henry collect himself.
“She didn’t even see me. Last night.”
“She…it happened before. She carries the world on her shoulders, until… She saw nothing last night.”
“Not true. She saw you, Henry. You.”
I got up, my legs protesting after being seated for hours. I straightened my dress.
“How do you see me, Henry?”
He grasped for words. I was being unfair.
“You are stunning, Veronica…but…”
“If I were to drop the dress to the floor, shed down to nothing, and bare it all, Henry?”
He stood.
“I’ve seen you at your worst, Veronica. Your most fragile.”
His voice trembled.
“No one’s asked me how I felt, what I saw, what I did.”
He hugged me.
“That night, I saw everything that had happened in that room. You’re asking me for words. I have none. I felt rage and anger, and I did the only thing I could do.”
He trembled.
“I made sure the most precious part of me, what makes me tick, what makes me get up when I don’t have to, to drink bitter coffee…I made sure I could continue doing that. Because you and her?”
He held me by the shoulder and looked into my eyes.
“There is nothing there that I cannot love.”
He hugged me again. No, he embraced me with all that he is.
“All you have to do is open your heart to it.”
***
The morning dragged into afternoon, but Alice wasn’t there to see it. Her breathing was still, quiet. Resting.
There was a knock at the door.
Child Services.
They had no fucking right.
And still, Henry just came with them.
I have never felt that cold.
I should have fought for him.
Torn down the middle.
Between her and him.
I didn’t even think to bring my makeup kit…
I need to be beautiful.
For her.
Henry’s voice boomed through the walls.
“I said later, I said it polite, but you two are everything that’s wrong with the system! Neglect?! She’s in there! In need of one thing! Love! So, either you call the cops, or you go home!”
And deafening silence.
She hummed.
Scattered words.
We believed..
Torn between dream and silent sleep
…bless me…
Louder
Come the dawn
Come the dawn
Henry slid through the door.
His face was red with anger, but his eyes on me and her tendered instantly.
She woke with a gasp. Eyes wide. Staring at the stark wall at the end of the room.
“Come the dawn. Come the dawn. Come the dawn!”
Rapid fire.
Then stilled.
I squeezed her hand.
She turned to me.
“You’re beautiful,” she whispered.
“I know.”
She stared. Green sparkles.
“You want to kiss me, don’t you?” I whispered. In honey.
I stole her words against my lips.
Lingered.
Grounding her.
“Fuck…” she moaned, “I hurt everywhere.”
“You were lost,” I whispered.
“You were, fur-ball…but Veronica found you, and I don’t care how much you hurt,” Henry said, “I’m going to need a hug.”
I realized, maybe it was time to let Alice be daddy’s girl, I wasn’t sure she’d ever had the opportunity to be just that before.
“I’m just gonna go to the little girl’s room, freshen up a bit. Grab a coffee. Smell the air.”
“Don’t leave me,” she whispered, still holding on to Henry.
“Leave you?”
It dawned on me, and I should have known, of course she wouldn’t wake up soft and tender and allow me to whisper sweetly.
“No, babe. But it’s hard loving you when I’m pissing myself. Besides, he’s got you.”
Shutting the door behind me didn’t feel like abandoning. Simply because it wasn’t. Henry needed that time more than I, and so did she. More than any of us. And, yes, I was about to piss myself.
‘Women’ the sign said. ‘Men’, the other. No in between. Not even a crack. I took a breath. Deeper.
“Woman,” I whispered.
The best ideas are often born to the trickle in the bowl.
The place where you can truly be yourself with your thoughts.
It was a long trickle, enough to think and remember.
I found the card tucked into the small pocket of my purse.
“David?”, he answered.
“Sort of…” I said.
“You in trouble?”
“Worse…”
I stood by the main entrance and watched them arrive. They didn’t see me. Why would they?
They were looking for a scrawny, scared boy.
Adam was handsome, something about men in uniform, and Anothny was a god. Under different circumstances, I’d let my eyes linger on them just a little longer.
I walked over.
“Looking for someone, officer?” I honeyed.
They replied without looking.
I giggled.
Now they looked.
With annoyance.
“Oh, don’t be like that, Adam,” I teased.
Confusion.
A halt.
Recognition.
He grabbed Anthony’s arm, “Damn…David?”
“Well…not anymore, not even half the time.”
“Are you ok?”
“Let’s go sit,” I whispered.
That’s how, under the stark light of the hospital cafeteria, strangers passing by, mourners drifting through, Adam and Anthony heard of the raging waterfall, the knife, the sex, and Alice. And Henry.
“I…I’m going to put my badge down because…there’s too many offences to go on record.”
Anthony took his hand.
“You said to call…”
Anthony, as it turns out, had a booming voice, “You did the right thing. Veronica.”
“Can you make it go away?”
I tried to keep it together.
I hadn’t cried for her. Yet.
But I started bawling for him.
“Please,” I begged, “He’s all love.”
“I wish you’d called last night…if Child Services already opened a case…well, it’s a bitch…” Adam said, whispering secrets.
“No,” I bawled, “You need to tell me that there’s something in that fucking system that actually works. Everything can’t be broken!”
“Hush,” Adam said but pulled me into his shoulder. “I said it’s a bitch, and it is.”
Anthony put his hand on my shoulder, and to everyone passing by, they were two empathetic officers telling me my mom didn’t survive the accident.
“We…we have a few friends working at Child Services. This isn’t home, this is the city. We’ll poke around. No promises.”
It was still more to hang onto than I’d ever had.
I let go of the embrace. Dried my tears. Drank my coffee.
“This,” Adam said, presenting me with his hand, “Looks good on you. You’re tougher than I ever was.”
“Thank you, officer,” I giggled through my tears.
“No. You’re stunning.”
Then, I made good on my promise to catch some air. It was a Saturday. I could get some makeup and buy some decent lunch.
And fuck me if I didn’t have a hair removal session booked at 2:30.
I stepped out of Walgreens with the essentials and found a food truck with burgers that looked just about greasy enough for Alice.
I passed a table with a group of teenagers, hanging, eating, bragging…shooting the shit.
“Hey! Lookin’ good! Damn!”
I blushed.
Wiggled my hips a little more.
And smiled.
I’m unsure if Alice was happier to see the burger than me, but I didn’t care; I didn’t have time.
I kissed her, hugged Henry, and told them I had an appointment.
“You stay here and do nothing. I got shit to do.”
Another session of frying my face.
But I almost longed for it.
Because it was working.
But fuck me, when that was done, I needed Alice-time.
But once again, the system stood there as a fucking pillar of fuck.
As I stepped into the room, doctors…nurses…and fuck fuckery.
“With her history, this is the second time she’s in here for this. And considering her age. And, we had a look at her mother’s medical history. It could be hereditary.”
Dr. Fuck.
“There’s a worrying pattern, Mr. Caldwell, and we must take that seriously.”
Dr. Dick-Measuring Envy
Nurse Pity Eyes and Nurse Protocol McFuck nodded in agreement.
But the one with the broom stuffed up her ass so tight her nose pointed to the ceiling; she was the real danger. A fucking witch riding her broom just to fucking hard.
“The actual fuck?” I said, “This is not happening. You take your fuckery out of this room; you take your judgmental fucking fuckery someplace else. You un-fuck your fuck so hard, or else…I’m gonna fuck you all!”
Silence.
Little Mrs. Broomstick pointed her nose a bit further towards the skies, “Excuse me, miss? Who are you?”
Did she, really?
“I’m your fucking shut the fuck up! ‘She’ is a fucking person! She’s a teenager taking it too far, too quickly, too intense, but fuck me, her nose doesn’t fling to the roof when she takes one up her ass! You need to fucking leave now!”
“There’s no need for that kind of language…”
I stepped forward, my breath sharp, my hands clenched.
“Dr. Dick-Measuring Envy!” I snarled, my voice slicing through the sterile air like a blade.
He flinched. Good.
“That’s not shutting the fuck up! Need?! What the fuck do you know about need?”
I pointed straight at him, fire burning in my chest. His lips parted like he might try to say something, but he didn’t. He just stood there, caught between arrogance and fear.
I turned to Nurse Protocol McFuck, her clipboard clutched like a shield, her beady little eyes darting between me and her superior.
“Didn’t she spank you good enough?” I seethed. “Is that it? You need a real fucking whipping?! You want to feel need?!”
I gestured wildly toward Alice, sitting there half-broken, hollow-eyed, more alive than any of them could ever dream to be.
“Look at her! You should see a girl in need of love and care!”
But they didn’t.
They saw a case number. A liability. A fucking problem to manage.
My breath hitched. I took a step closer, and Dr. Fuck actually backed away.
“But no… you have your precious fucking protocols. Your fucking paperwork. Your fucking diagnosis syndrome.”
I pointed to Little Mr. Broomstick, standing there like she was carved from ice, her nose still lifted as if it might reach the ceiling if she just clenched hard enough.
“You think you’re so fucking untouchable, don’t you?” I hissed. “With your judgmental fuckery, your superiority complex, your smug-ass rules that mean fuck-all when a real human being is lying right in front of you?!”
I exhaled sharply. My heart pounded.
I turned back to Dr. Dick-Measuring Envy, locking eyes, feeling the words surge from my throat, raw and unchecked.
“Get. The. Fuck. Out.”
I stepped forward, voice shaking the walls.
“Before I fuck you all up.”
Silence.
A flicker of hesitation.
Then—
They scuttled.
Like fucking roaches when the light turns on.
Alice sat on the bed, cross-legged and bare feet, tears trailing her face. Clapping her hands.
“Veronica Caldwell,” she whispered, “Never have I ever loved you more than now.”
“Wait until tomorrow,” I whispered, accepting Henry’s hug, “Good thing they left, I was running out of fucks.”
The doctors wanted to keep Alice at the hospital just as much as they wanted to get rid of her. Alice wanted to leave the hospital as soon as she tasted the coffee.
Henry only wanted to make sure she was safe. So, we lingered on.
“The insurance covers everything,” he said, “Paid for by the University until the day I croak. I’m gonna be well into my mid-hundred-and-fifties before that happens. Just out of spite.”
They ran their tests.
In silence.
I held her hand. She let me.
“I had a dream,” she whispered, nose wiggling, “There was a fire and a band playing, and the stars were singing. And I sang back at them. And they applauded, but when I didn’t see you…everything faded. I saw Dad and asked for help.”
She looked at me.
“Only,” he wasn’t really there, you know? And everything went dark. I couldn’t see you.”
I squeezed her hand. Hard.
“I’m here,” I whispered, “I never left.”
“You weren’t in my dream.”
She wasn’t accusing me…stating it.
“I sang for you…but you weren’t there.”
“You crashed, babe.”
I swallowed.
“You almost died.”
Her eyes said nothing; they just held onto me.
“And you prettied yourself for me.”
I kissed her.
“I think, we need to get you home. And I think, you need to be daddy’s girl for a while. No booze, no fucks, no…”
“Don’t fucking say it.”
“Weed.”
She sighed. First, high in her chest.
Then, from her gut.
“You’re a cruel mistress, Veronica Caldwell.”
Dr. Penis Envy knocked softly on the door, asking for Henry.
Henry arched an eyebrow, his coffee cup hovering just below his lips.
“Doctor,” he muttered under his breath, setting the cup down. “This oughta be good.”
Alice smirked—just barely—but it was there. A flicker of her.
Henry stood, stretched with a groan, and cracked his knuckles like he was about to walk into a damn poker match.
“Ladies,” he said, giving us a two-finger salute. “Try not to burn the place down while I’m gone.”
The door shut behind him, and for a moment, the world stood still.
Alice tilted her head toward me, green eyes glassy but sharp.
“Dr. Penis-Measuring Envy,” she murmured.
I shrugged. “It fits. Besides, I’ve renamed him Penis Envy, for short.”
She huffed, shaking her head. “You’re insane.”
“You love it.”
She didn’t deny it.
Henry reappeared.
“You girls ready to go home?”
Alice is a tank; she always was. And despite what she’d put her system through, there was no medical reason to hold her there. And they’d measured penises and decided they didn’t want to be fucked.
And walking out of that hospital, arm in arm with my girl? That feeling running through my veins? I’d never been that high in my entire life.
I’d like to see anyone try to stand in my way.
Because I am Veronica Caldwell, and if you fuck with my family…you’d better be prepared for a fucking.
The road was just what we needed.
Henry gathered his thoughts.
Alice and me?
We traced touches as if they were anew.
I sent Henry to the store.
Hot chocolate, soup, popcorn, and that Belgian chocolate.
“Oh, and Henry, if you tap the pineapple on the bum…”
“Yeah, yeah. If she squirts, she’s spent, yada, yada.”
He got his coat and his keys, opened the door, and let out a sigh.
“Just…”
“We’re good, Henry,” I assured, “No crashing, slashing or burning while you’re out.”
I hugged him, just to make sure.
It was those lingering moments of comfortable silence that gave room for healing. I watched her watch me. Effortlessly.
When Henry came back from the store, he stocked the fridge, made dinner, and phoned Clair, leaving a message letting her know what had happened, one that would never be answered.
The man Child Services wanted to take down for being too perfect.
Fucking fuckery.
Let them try. I’m still Veronica Caldwell. Then, now, and forever. And I’m ready to be your fuck.
Alice looked at me.
“What’s wrong, babe?”
“What isn’t?” I sighed.
“Fucking this, right here,” she said, brushing my hand.
I would have carried her to bed hadn’t Henry done it. I watched him have his moment, sitting on the bedside, running his fingers through her hair. I wished they’d had more moments like that, but I still felt that ugly envy that they did.
“Sorry, Veronica…I’ll let you get to bed. Watch over her?”
“Always,” I whispered, “But…first, I have a date. With a boy on his last whispers.”
Under the light in the bathroom, he stared ghostly at me.
“Not tonight, David,” I sighed, “I’ll let you out and play on Monday, okay? Just let me be pretty tonight.”
Sunday came and went, the usual drift into Monday morning. The regret of having to do what we had to do.
She hated binding me, hiding me, but I enjoyed her touch. And somehow, after everything, putting him on felt like an escape.
Not from me—us—but from the world.
Alice couldn’t hide, and I felt sorry for her.
Alice wasn’t just quirky and on the right side of cute. She was a force. I hadn’t even seen that…before me. But being Alice came with expectations; right now, maybe she just needed to be one of the girls.
Shy. Insecure.
Because she was tired.
That wasn’t in her blood, though, so when she boarded that bus, she was fire.
I didn’t sit next to her. I let her escape the freak show.
I played my part.
She played hers.
I found her dozing on our bench, and I didn’t care. I sat next to her. She was my sister, after all.
“My tits ache,” I said.
“My body aches,” she replied.
She sighed. Let herself be less her, brushed a curl from her eye, and looked at me only to look away.
“What if they’re right?” she said, twitching her nose, “What if she fucking decided to define me in the ugliest way?”
“The drinking?”
“Yeah.”
“Then you stop.” I said, “Because you’re Alice fucking Caldwell, and nothing touches you.”
“You did,” she whispered.
“No,” I said, “I ruined you.”
She shrugged her shoulders.
“Apology accepted.” Soft, like only Alice could do soft.
She stood, her oversized boots crashing with her pink skirt.
“Catch some naked later?” she said, not giving me time to answer.
I drifted, more Veronica than David, almost not caring.
I crossed my legs and did pretty.
Allison was brave.
“David…” she whispered, and both shame and intrigue shone in her eyes, “are you gay?”
There it was.
I let David handle it.
“Uh…not really,” I made him stutter.
“Oh…what…not really? What does that mean?”
David didn’t handle it well.
She touched my hand.
“I just…school and stuff…”
At least I got the voice right.
“Oh…” she whispered lower, “It’d be a shame. You’re cute and…not stupid like the others.”
“Thank you. I think?”
“No one’s flirted with you before, have they?” she said, ensuring no one saw or heard.
“I…no.”
Slightly cracking, still holding.
“If you’d like…there’s this movie I’d like to see? Maybe you and me?”
I’m glad I didn’t leave the rest of the conversation to David.
Rejection is a bitch.
There was no good reason for David to say no. But he had to.
“I can’t,” I forced out, stronger, more certainty, yet gentle.
Disappointment.
A hint of hurt.
“It’s not like that, Allison,” I said, adding a twist of remorse.
“Alice?” she said.
“You can’t tell anyone. Please.”
A hint of my eyes on top of his voice. It was easy. I felt sorry for her.
“You and her?”
“No,” I said, “Just me.”
“Oh,” she whispered, “You’re special, David. Let me know if…things change.”
She kissed my cheek.
When she stood, the moment was broken.
“You’ll still help me with that assignment.”
“Yes…sure…of course. Later.”
Pure David.
Alice delivered on her promise of nakedness.
Nothing dirty, nothing taken.
Just shared.
Finding rhythm.
Finding meaning.
Finding glow.
And somehow, we made it through another week.
Our appointment with Dr. Leigh on Friday. He was more worried about Alice than my progress because he was happy with me.
My hair removal appointment the day after, going back to the hospital, was fun.
“I heard you made quite the scene last week,” Dr. Stanchovic teased.
She had her own fuck with the system, but she tried fucking it from the inside.
“I’m famous?”
“Un-fuck your fuck? Legendary.”
She fried my face and turned my pretty into ugly, at least for a few hours.
“You’re making progress, Veronica. Your skin is what I call welcoming.”
I smiled.
Dr. Stanchovic was the type to pull my horny.
And that was my struggle every time I felt it.
The challenge I faced in feeling.
I tried so hard to find myself in that
But not even with Alice.
It made me feel stuck.
In between.
Chasing the dawn.
