Lieserl

This is the beginning of a book I might write.

“You aren’t making Lieserl go.”

“Well, she’s sick. You can’t make sick people do anything.”

“Can I at least get a book?”

“Fine.” Tricia’s usually pretty lenient about this stuff, but dare I come even close to hurting precious Satchel’s feelings, my mother is strict. Satchel’s always the smart one in her head, even though I get better grades now.

Who am I kidding? Tricia doesn’t care about intelligence. Satchel’s the one with friends. And my only friend is Satchel.

I stomp up the stairs, making them creak and shudder. I hate this house. It’s old and it has ugly wallpaper and creaky stairs.

I fling the door open, walking straight to the bookshelf. Lord of the Flies. I’ll read that. I got it for Christmas, from my aunt. She’s always bugging me to read the classics.

“I hope you’re happy with your faking-sick skills,” I say to Lieserl. She’s the master of faking sick. She doesn’t say anything. That b***h. I turn around.

Oh my god. She’s hanging there, by a thin piece of rope, from the railing of our bunk bed, her toes brushing the floor. Her head is tilted at an odd angle, her eyes wide open. Oh my god.

I run down the stairs, still clutching the book in my left hand. Oh my god.

“Mom, Mom, Mom!” I shout, running out into the front hallway.

“What is it, we have to--”

“Lieserl hung herself. I think. I dunno. She hung herself.” Lieserl wouldn’t do that. Perhaps someone else hung her. She doesn’t have a reason to hang herself. If anyone does, it’s me. Oh my god. Tricia runs up the stairs.

I think I know how Hadley felt. Except he had a few months to say goodbye. A few months in which the cancer hadn’t killed Ella’s brain, turned her into someone else, someone who laughs at everything and tells you the same things over and over, and oh my god, Lieserl’s dead.

“We still going to my clarinet concert?” Satchel asks quietly.

“You f*****g piece of s**t, what is wrong with you, I hate you!” I shout, grabbing him by the shoulders and pushing him into the wall. He would have stopped me, if he had been expecting it. He wasn’t expecting it, luckily.

He doesn’t say anything. How dare he not say anything? You don’t just stand there and listen to your sister insult you. You don’t just stand there when your other sister just hung herself.

“You heartless monster,” I say in my creepy whisper-voice I’ve been practicing, “How dare you even consider the fact that we might be going to your stupid clarinet concert?!”

“It was just an innocent question! I didn’t mean to be rude,” he says. How dare he be polite at a time like this? This is what’s wrong with him, he’s always so good and polite. I hate him.

“Shut your mouth you mediocre clarinet player!” I yell without thinking. What is wrong with me? Now is not the time to quote Spongebob. Why am I the kind of person who just goes around quoting Spongebob, of all things?

And he laughs. You can’t laugh at a time like this! You just can’t. “Did you seriously just quote Spongebob?”

“Yes.” I punch him in the face and run out the door. I don’t know what I’m doing. This can’t be happening. This isn’t fair.

When Ella died, Hadley had me. He wasn’t alone. And he had months to deal with it. But Lieserl can’t just go like that, she can’t just leave us and not say anything, she can’t do that to us.

Then again, Hadley was six, but that doesn’t count for anything. Six-year-olds don’t understand death. They don’t understand anything, though my six-year-old self would beg to differ.

And now Lieserl is gone, and Hadley isn’t here. He hasn’t been here for years. He isn’t here to help me. I’m drowning.

I wish his parents hadn’t been so heartless to get divorced. Hadley was my only friend. And I’ll never see him again. He will never be here to help me. I’ve only got Satchel, and Satchel’s awful.

I run down the street, pass all the little houses that look the same, the houses with their own people and their own problems who aren’t a part of my world. I run until I get to the playground, the little rickety playground that I’ve always played on. I sit on a swing.

I need to escape. I need to get away from all of this. I open the book. The boy with fair hair lowered himself down the last few feet of rock . . .

Author's Note

This isn't a complete story, and I haven't really edited it. Please tell me what you think!