The silliest things shatter you. A T-shirt discovered behind the washing machine. A toy that rolled under a cabinet in the garage, forgotten until someone drops something and goes to fetch it, and suddenly they’re on the concrete floor sobbing into a dusty baseball mitt.
Victoria SchwabIf Mom was feeling ambitious, she scribbled a small list of items beneath the word, but seeing as her handwriting is virtually illegible, we won’t know what’s in each box until we actually open it. Like Christmas. Except we already own everything.
Victoria SchwabIt’s not that Mom didn’t keep anything, it’s that she kept the wrong things. We leave memories on objects we love and cherish, things we use and wear down.
Victoria SchwabCuriosity is a gateway drug to sympathy.
Victoria SchwabM. That’s what I call her, this normal, nonexistent me. It’s not that I’ve never done those things, kissed or danced or just “hung out.” I have. But it was put-on, a character, a lie. I am so good at it—lying—but I can’t lie to myself. I can pretend to be M; I can wear her like a mask. But I can’t be her. I’ll never be her.
Victoria SchwabBen is ten and he’s dead. But he’s not gone. Not for me.
Victoria SchwabI pull the key from around my neck and slip it into the hole beneath my brother’s card. It doesn’t turn. It never turns. But I never stop trying.
Victoria SchwabI do want it. I want you to stay. Time and disease are taking you from me. You’ve told me, made it clear, this is the only way I can keep you close. I will not lose that.
Victoria SchwabI want to be oblivious to the hurt written on her face. I want to be selfish and young and normal. M would be that way. She would need space to grieve. She would rebel because her parents were simply uncool, not because one was wearing a horrifying happy mask and the other was a living ghost. She’d be distant because she was preoccupied with boys or school, not because she’s tired from hunting down the Histories of the dead, or distracted by her new hotel-turned-apartment, where the walls are filled with crimes.
Victoria SchwabLying is easy. But it’s lonely.
Victoria SchwabTag: lying
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