Chapter One: Tell Me No Secrets

On Friday nights, the devil came out of Tannith Jane. Thudding bass spilled out of the passenger side of Brent Miller’s lifted pick up, followed by the lilt of my sister’s breathless laughter. I lifted myself as high as I could from my seat on the toilet lid, eyeing my discarded cane as I tried to peek inconspicuously through the faded lace curtains at the pair of them. Their bodies twined together closer than a creeper vine, one of her hands threaded through the tendrils of his dirty blonde hair, the other dangling a half empty bottle of Southern Comfort between two fingers. He slid his hands into her back pockets, her mouth still cradling a laugh as he kissed her.

I ducked out of sight before she could catch me and glanced down into the window of the plastic stick in my hand. Three months ago, the devil had come out of me too, but Colley women were especially used to courting trouble. And two solid lines were definitely trouble.

I tucked the evidence into the waistband of my shorts as the screen door slammed and Janey’s footsteps shuffled around the living room. The soft clink of glass made my neck hair stand on end, my heart thumping so loud I could count the seconds by its beats, until she rounded the corner and I remembered the bottle of SoCo. She raised an eyebrow at me.

“Couldn’t make it in time?”

I shook my head even though the answer was obvious. Janey scanned the room until she spotted my cane and slid it closer with her boot. “Keeping this closer would help and you know that. Which is exactly why you can empty it yourself.”

I sucked my teeth tersely. “Yeah, fine. How was your evening?”

“Fine.”

She waited just long enough to make sure I was steady on my feet before slinking back into the living room. I rolled my eyes as I gripped the basin from under the toilet chair and carefully slid it free from the frame. I wobbled for a second and I shifted slightly to regain my center of gravity.

Exhaling a breath, I cautiously tiptoed past where Janey had settled herself on the couch, her gaze dark as she stared down the gothically ornate glass bottle that loomed over Mama’s ashes on the mantle. A mini prayer houseplant separated the two vessels, its forest green leaves withered into black curls similar to our own. She absently ran her fingers over her long shirt sleeves.

“Y’know, if I spill this all over myself it’s ending up in your boots next time,” I said tightly.

Her eyes darted over to where she’d tucked her boots under the coffee table. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“As sure as shootin.”

She erupts into that same laughter and the pall breaks. I laugh with her, the sound both foreign and familiar. I give her a wan smile as I watch her shoulders slump.

“Brat.”

Tension snaps back into her shoulders as a tinkling rattle crests and falls around the room. The muscles in my calves are taut as marionette strings as I go rigid. A leaf from the prayer plant drops from its stem as it spasms as though in pain, Janey mirroring the movement as she grips her forearms.

She mutters an expletive under her breath and my lungs seize as the air around us goes stale. I try not to retch as I re-double my hold on both my cane and the basin.

My sister’s command cuts through the panic. “Go.”

My legs are cemented so firmly to the floor I cry out as I try desperately to lift them. I don’t want to leave her, but it’ll only get worse if I do. It always does. We lock eyes and she spits out another word, “don’t.”

I open my mouth to protest, but I know too well that’s futile.

“Don’t acknowledge it.”

I do the only thing I can. I add distance. I march painfully and resolutely down the hall and lurch into the bathroom. I manage to drop the basin haphazardly into the sink before I crawl towards the toilet and heave. Mercifully, this one I can flush. And I do. Once, twice, again as my stomach twists and bile deep as graveyard dirt spills into the bowl.

I wipe my sweaty brow with the back of my hand and feebly lift myself up by yanking on the edge of the sink. Cane be damned, just like the rest of us. I tip the basin into the bowl with the rest and see the streaks of red before the flush. From urine to blood in a flash. I collapse on the floor as a dark shape outline swims across my vision.

“Daddy?”