Suicide Crashings

A sister realizes each finds their own way, and she is no expert on the right way.

Category:  General Fiction  Posted:  June 23, 2006      Views: 50

They heard it - like a plane crashing through buildings. It flew and it hit. It flew and it hit. It was randomly crashing into the porch door, the wicker loveseat, the wall behind them. It moved quick and suddenly. It could be, in one moment, right above their heads and in the next moment be by their feet. When the sound came too close, Evelyn and her sister Katie would fly off like startled birds screeching and fluttering about till it felt safe to land again. Each would land in one of the four dingy lawn chairs that was scattered across Katie's porch. Evelyn was on the edge of her chair with her feet placed far in front of her where she could see them, and she noticed that her sister Katie's  was still standing - bent over with her back towards Evelyn. She was examining closely her porch door that led into her kitchen. "Look." Katie said this as she moved to the side of the door offering Evelyn a profile view, who studied her sister's jeans noticing how loose they were, and how her sister seemed to go up and down like a tall weed. No,she decided, she was more like a medium-sized weed, because her sister seemed shorter somehow. Evelyn did not understand how height could diminish, so she debated in her head about this shortening effect. Katie had lost weight. This was obvious, and she did seem shorter. Her now childlike body diminished her stature making her appear shorter as well as smaller. Katie spoke again. "Look. It's huge. What is it?" "I don't know. I don't know anything about bugs." Evelyn heard the annoyance that escaped from inside her that coated each of her words. She was annoyed with the bug. It kept interrupting their conversation. It kept sending them off to the dingy lawn chairs in the far dark corners of the porch. "It looks like a beetle. It's huge." "Beetles don't fly." She was annoyed that her sister could only talk about the bug. She looked at Katie's face which was so intently looking at their noisy intruder. Her face emanated a childlike curiosity - intent and open and expressive. Curiosity had been the driving force behind many of Katie's life decisions, and her recent divorce was no exception. She left her husband, curious about a single life and one particular short order cook. She wanted to talk to her sister about him. She should, but their noisy intruder was making that impossible. Her sister was smiling with raised eyebrows, and Evelyn was reminded of so many similar childhood images. She softened, putting aside her resolve to discuss him, and changed her statement to a question, "Beetles don't fly, do they?" Their conversation was interrupted yet again as the 'beetle" continued its suicide crashings. It flew and it crashed. It flew and it crashed. It flew again and it crashed. It crashed hard into the wall, the chairs, and even the floor this time. Each time they heard it hit, it sounded like a slap across the face, but what was worse was the sound it made after it crashed - a sizzling sound similar to cold water being added to a hot frying pan. It sounded like a television when the cable is out, but Evelyn thought it was most like the sound static electricity should make if the volume could be turned on or if you could be small enough to hear. Fly. Crash. Fly. Crash. Fly. Crash. It was loud and each time there was that high-pitched static sound that now sounded like a miniature electrical storm. The whole time the rapt expression on Emily's face remained unchanged. It was like how Evelyn had sounded on the phone earlier, moving to and fro, to and fro, giving off her own static electricity. "She is a size four!" She almost yelled into the phone. "I know she's too slim. I told her -" "Slim! Ma, Slim is a size eight. A size six maybe." "I know. I told her maybe she was losing too much weight." "Did you know she is a size four?" "She said she ordered a size two bridesmaid dress for Susan's wedding." Their mother, Gertrude, sounded impressed by this fact. "She's crazy slim, Mom. She doesn't look right. It doesn't look right. It's not healthy." "I know I told her she might be too slim." Her mother had a way of emphasizing the word I that seemed constricting. It bristled Evelyn. "This has happened before, Mom, when she's lost weight, and when she's made the wrong choice in men." "I know. I wish she had never got divorced. I just don't understand. She was in a perfectly good marriage. Why leave?" "Ma, Katie doesn't seem to like perfectly good." "She had seemed happy with him. It was not a bad relationship. " "Katie seems to like bad relationships, Mom. She seems to gravitate to them. Look at whose she's involved with now." "Well, I don't know about that. She had been happy in her marriage, in the beginning with Ken. I think he was good for her. You know she was a difficult teenager. She seemed to really settle down and behave herself with him. I wonder if it is not too late for them." "Ma, she cheated on him and now she is involved with a married man." "Well I don't know about that." "Ma, I've told you all this before - just like I have told before about how she throws up food sometimes. She's really not eating at all practically. And you are ignoring this relationship issue. I'm going to talk to her about him tonight. I think he's her problem." She emphasized her Is this time the same way her mother did. "Well, just be careful of what you say. I wouldn't say too much. She's very delicate right now." "Well somebody needs to say something. We can't just let her waste away." "Well, maybe you're right, but I just wish for her that she'd find someone nice who will make her happy." "She needs to make herself happy, Mom." "You know I always say happiness come from within." The conversation ended soon after this comment. Evelyn listened to her mother change the subject to her brother's marriage which "she just wasn't so sure of", and she ignored her inner voice, or inner child, that wanted to scream out, "You did this. You modeled this type of behavior. You are guilty of not making yourself happy. You give us that advice, yet you never do this." But she knew where it would get her. Nowhere. "Do you think we should kill it? Put it out of its misery. It's got to be hurting itself, and it can't seem to find its way out of here," Katie asked looking to her for an answer. Katie's face was full of soft rounded corners. She had a small upturned noise, arching eyebrows, full cheeks, lush pouting lips quick to smile, and big blue eyes. As sisters, they had been born with two very different faces, and Evelyn knew that people saw in her face all corners and all angles and seriousness. "A classical face with classical features", their mother would say. She had a sharp prominent nose, thick eyebrows, protruding cheekbones, and thin lips that got lost in a smile. Her eyes, blue too, seemed gray due to their location and size, small and deep-set in her face. Evelyn had thought often how their personalities had come to match their physical appearance, and in this moment, her sister's face looked no different that when she was five asking the same question about a wayward ant. "No." It was a soft no that Evelyn said. She added, "We should just wait. It will find its way."

Reviews

[Bamber AKA. AM-HAM]

Wierd...but interseting.