Psych chapter 2

Chapter 2

I extend my supple fingers, reveling in the thrill of power spiking up in movement’s wake. I am animated. I have found control. I smirk, thin, swollen lips twisting into a feral grin. I twitch my wrist next, “smile” growing longer. I can feel the air thickening around me. I can feel! Feel ! Me!

A cackle bubbles up in my chest (oh yes, I have a chest), and I release it, enjoying the sensation of true, tangible mania. 

Tangible. The world at my fingertips. MY fingertips. They belong firmly to me. No Cecilia. No Mia. Just I. Me. Thea. 

I exhale the word, euphoria frothing up within me, spilling over. Thea. I am Thea. I am. 

Words. I am speaking. I am speaking words. My lips (LIPS) are moving, forming shapes. My tongue (I have a fricken tongue! Do you hear that? You should! I’m saying it after all!)  is flicking and curving, and swishing slimily about in my mouth (which, if you haven’t guessed, is another thing I have!) . My larynx is sending humming vibrations through my throat, extending, barely perceptible, into my veins, and traveling into my gooseflesh…

“Mia?”

A timid voice hits my ears (this time I barely pause to enjoy the sensation, the ownership, of this sentiment.)

I turn, my abdomen (…) contorting. My lips curl upwards into a furious sneer.

“There is no Mia,” I snarl.

There is magic in saying the words, but, also, a sense of horror. They are my words, my declaration. But for the first time I notice…It is her  voice. 

Fury washes over me. I want to grab something with these hands, and feel it crumble between these fingers. I want to break the remnants of that insolent girl, shatter them into nonexistence. This is my body. Mine. How dare she remain in even the smallest speck! How dare she!

“B--where’s…Mia? Where is she?”

The younger one is talking now. Kara, I recall (I, not her!). 

She is staring at me, dismayed, bewildered. My eyes narrow. 

“She is gone. She does not exist. She never did. Only me. Theah. I am Theah.”

“But Mia,” Kara starts again.

“Do not say that name again,” I roar. 

She flinches back into her sister’s arms, completely and utterly disarmed. As it should be. 

Emily, the eldest, has wrapped her arms around the younger girl’s small body. She is staring at me in horror. Then, she has the audacity to murmur into the shell of Kara’s ear:

“Don’t fret. Mia will be back. She always is.”

I can feel wrath seeping from my every pore. 

“What was that Emily?”

Emily twitches, her muscles tensing. She exhales a deep shivering breath, then lifts her head, eyes greener than Mia….I have ever seen them. They pierce me and beneath their torrid glare, I nearly shrink.

“I said for her not to worry. Mia will be back. Mia always comes back.” 

Her voice is confident. Only the restrained tremor of her long, pale fingers and the twitches of her bony wrists betrays her. The shrinking feeling evaporates and in its place a cold rage condenses, cementing itself into my heart. She will never be back!

Abruptly, I throw my head forward as hard as I possibly can. It slams onto her kneecap and there is a loud pop. My head is bleeding now (this time I do pause to reflect on the startling burst of agony rocking through my core), and her leg, which had been lifting in an automatic attempt to escape the strange blow, has snapped into an odd angle. She releases a strangled cry. I take advantage of my position and leap onto her legs, holding her down, one leg on either side. Kara is gaping, from the side, slowly backing up. I perceive this for a second; then, turning my head fully towards her and catching her innocent brown eyes in a searing deadlock, I grasp Emily’s neck and slam her head back onto the headboard. She screams. A smile twists my face. Kara sobs. The Earth is still.

And then it moves again, and there are footsteps pounding up the stairs.  I leap off of Mia’s bleeding half-sister and scramble beneath the bed on instinct. Above me, I can feel the bed creek as Emily arranges herself. The blanket is tugged into place, and then Kara moves into a particularly grimy corner, smearing herself. I realize what they are doing, and cannot hold back a miniscule sprouting of admiration. The blanket will be draped over Emily, who will push past the pain to feign sleep, and Kara will say that she fell and knocked something over. Something heavy. I watch a lamp appear on the floor. Kara bends the shade and bashes in the bulb against the bed’s wrought iron edge. She stands and I know she is applying an expression of startled horror to her face. The tears will help. 

The door opens and I tense, holding myself tight. Mia’s grandfather lumbers in. 

“What’s going on?” he rumbles. 

“I just fell really hard, grandfather,” Kara says, voice peculiarly sweet. Someday, this girl would make a terrific actress…or an absolutely terrible one perhaps…A shiver courses down my spine and I pull my muscles taut against the dust-ridden floor. 

A dung-beetle creeps jauntily into my line of sight and I glower at it. To my right,  grandfather is shifting his weight irritably, jowls drooping and wobbling loosely as he shakes his balding head. 

“Keep quiet ya hear me? Ya wanna join yer sister?” he admonishes in a groaning, bitter tone. His words are harsh, grating, the threat in them evident, yet, somehow tepid, at least in contrast to the Mia’s past encounters with him. She was his least favorite…Now, I must take the reins…. 

“Of course not sir,” Kara replies, voice humble and good natured, though when I glance upwards from my station I can see a vague sneer twisting her lips from the intended smile to a fierce simper. The old man pretends not to notice, harrumphing in acceptance. He quivers gently in his tattered brown  jacket and pulls the material closer to his emaciated frame, gnarled, spotted hands shaking as they slip contemplatively to the aging zipper. He pauses, turning back, wrinkling his crinkled brow in brief thought. The zipper spurts up in a quick jerking of twitchy fingers. His neck throws itself to the side a moment as he clears his throat, letting loose an audible crack. It should be a signal of his weakness, perhaps, but only adds an effortless, inhibiting sense of danger to his presence. A cater-pillaring eyebrow furrows.

“And no supper tonight. For you or Emily,” he supplies in an afterthought. 

“You’ll make me dinner and go straight to bed. Do we have an understanding?”

“Yeah,” Kara mutters, attempting to contain her revitalized resentment, though it continues to pulse defiantly off of her in waves. Her hands clench and unclench behind her back. 

“You have to speak up, missy. I’m deaf in one ear. As you should well know,” he growls, irritation reddening his blotchy complexion. 

I smother a snicker in the thick air. Missy?

“Yes sir!”

Kara salutes him impertinently, thin eyebrows arched, a wry grin now settling into place. He reels forward in a moment of cold annoyance and clips her ‘round the ears. Then he sweeps out (well, the best one can with the gait of the inwardly decaying, that is), leaving the acrid scent of onions and beets solidifying with all the stench possible to  muster in his wake. 

I smack my hand down on the dung-beetle the second I know myself to be out of earshot, its irritating guts splaying warmly over the palm of my hand. I’d win over the rat-b*****d in no time. That would be no concern. If anything, he’d probably want me to be his sole heir by the time I was through with him. Hell, he’d happily crawl into his grave if I asked him to. I would, of course, have everything. By this point, I was entitled, after all. Damn sonovab-

A hand wraps around my elbow and drags me from my dusty crevice. I push it away as I emerge, annoyance darting up once more. That elbow is mine. I am in control. No one grabs me. No one forces me. This is my body now…no…always, I reassure myself. Cecilia and Mia do not exist. Just me, in this body, in control. I snarl.

Kara steps back, palms raising in surrender, though her warm, chestnut eyes are growing hotter, shooting sparks. As her rage grows, the blocks of chestnut melt into a bright, hard caramel that very nearly matches her stiff cascading curls. Liquid fury. I feel my brow quirk into a smug ark. Emily has pushed aside the blankets and is watching us warily, cradling her stomach. I lick my lips, enjoying the rush of a battle. Adrenaline pulses through my body, heart jack hammering, nerves firing every which way, I tense, lowering my torso marginally, settling into a standing crouched-position. My teeth bare and my spine tightens. My focus is solely on the audacious child before me. She has dropped the pretense. It is an open fight.  

My hand flashes forward, smacking her across the face, then falling hard into a clump of curls. I yank, relishing the sensation of power, the pain striking across the impertinent girl’s pretty features. A lock of hair comes out in my hand and Kara screams out, fuming. 

She reaches blindly, somehow catching hold of my neck. I allow her to think herself successful for a moment, before thrusting my arms forward into the area just below her diaphragm. She releases me, gasping. I snort, throwing my palm against her head sharply so that her head is forced to the side, and down, like that of a lowly mongrel. She would realize her place. Then, smirking, I grasp another tight curl and pull her hard, face jerking painfully towards me. 

The hate in her eyes throws me for a second, and a tremor hits my spine. Mia.

She is clawing, thrashing. 

I back away to the bed, quavering infuriatingly. 

“No,” I say aloud.

Then louder, more forcefully.

“NO!”

I suddenly notice, as if through a sort of peculiar tunnel vision, the lifting of lips. Kara and Emily both, restraining battered, yet triumphant grins, hope glittering, alive, in their bloody faces. 

I must take that away from them. I must swipe of them the very ability to hope, at all. 

As if reacting to my renewed will, the tremors die away. I stop shaking, and a sneer twists my lips. Rubies part in horror. Hope withers with realization. I’m not going anywhere. 

“Mia?” Emily croaks, desperate, from behind me. 

I whirl. 

“Nope,” I murmur, reaching for her.

“Try again.”

“C-Cecilia?”

She’s desperate. Even Cecilia would be preferable over me. I grin.  I’m close enough to see the minuscule wrinkle of her eyes, as her body reacts to her horror and prepares to block out the world.

I lean closer, my cheek brushing hers. I turn, my lips against the shell of her ear. My breath sends shivers through her flesh. 

“You’re getting warmer,” I murmur.

The dangerous intimacy is too much, and she shoves me back, shaking. 

“Get out,” she says tremulously.

I take another step forward, arm extending. 

“Say my name, Emily.”

She’s shaking her head in vicious denial, hugging her stomach. 

“Emily,” I croon. 

She whimpers something unintelligible. 

I roll my eyes and lay a hand on her head, relishing her instinctive flinch. 

“That’s okay. I understand…I’ll be back.”

I leave, flouncing out, grinning from ear to ear. 

I’m going to destroy them. And I’m going to love every second of it.